1st Writer Games
by MAmidala
Summary: So on Wattpad there's this thing called The 1st Writer Games, which I am in. And these are my entries for that.
1. Interview

"And now, it's District Eleven!" Rookie shouts, making my heart catch. "Please welcome District Eleven's female tribute, Vervain Lehane!" Rookie gestures widely to the entrance to the stage and I'm ushered onto the stage.

I walk onto the stage dressed in a long, flowing peach and orange gown. My torso is covered in a halter top that was woven out of orange and peach-colored silk, small vines woven intricately into the fabric. My skirt flows from low on my waist to the floor, light as air and dancing with glitter on its orange silken surface. It flows with different layers and I twirl around, as per orders of my stylist, to show it off. My hair was down with little pink roses woven into my curls. The overwhelming scent of Rookie's perfume overtakes me as she greets me with air kisses on either cheek. She's at least six inches taller than I am, so she has to bend over slightly. Thankfully my dress makes me look taller than I actually am.

"Welcome, Vervain!" says Rookie with a bright smile, sitting down on one of the two chairs present. "Please! Sit, sit." She pats the other one and I sit down next to her, looking out into the sea of hungry eyes, waiting for me to speak my first public words since the reaping. I began to feel uncomfortable underneath the corset of my gown because it hung so closely to my skin.

"Hello, Rookie," I greet her back, smiling as best I could. It stung me to actually smile at her, her being just as much an instrument in the vile Games as the Gamemakers themselves. But I stuck it out and kept on smiling, looking as genuine as I could.

She gushes about how wonderful my dress looks and how stunning my hair is. I lick my pink-glossed lips, tasting the sweet yet artificial strawberry taste of it. "So, Vervain, let's start things off properly. "What is your motivation for these Games?" Rookie asks, leaning forward in her fuzzy pink chair.

I swallow hard, still smiling only now without baring my teeth. "Um . . . well," I debated over whether or not to tell her, and the rest of the nation, why exactly I'm so motivated to get these Games over with or just lie, but I finally chose the truth. It was lying that would gain me sponsors in this. "Well, my sister died a few months ago," I say, prompting Rookie's face to do a 180 from happy to crushed. I did my best to swallow the lump slowly forming in my throat. "And . . . and after that happened I took over the major duties in my family. I have two little sisters and another younger brother, as well as my mother. So, my motivation is to stay alive for them." Luckily for me, my voice cracked on the last word. I was on the verge of tears at the memory of sitting next to my sister on her death bed, holding her hand too tight, as she slipped away from me.

I jerk my stare up from the stage floor to our host when she speaks. "How poetic," she gushes with a wide, toothy smile, putting her hand over her heart. If there's one there. "It's so . . . full of honor that you're playing these Games for your family, Vervain."

Now I was going to make an attempt at humor. "Well, it's not like I'm playing these Games for myself, now is it?"

Rookie and the crowd erupt in laughter and I wonder if they've been giving laughing gas to make them laugh at everyone's poor, nervous jokes like that. Rookie catches her breath and puts her hand on mine. "Now, Vervain. In addition to your family, is there someone _special_ waiting for you back home in Eleven?"

I blink at the memory of him. His blueberry eyes, blond hair. I blink again, suddenly back where I'm supposed to be. No, this isn't where I'm supposed to be at all. I smile. "There's always been somebody," I laugh with a shrug. "Isn't there always? It's always been a one-way street, kind of. But . . . at the most I can hope that he's gonna be routing for me and will . . . be there when I get back." I give my head a little shake, unintentionally further selling my emotions to the crowd.

"How sweet," the pink-haired host smiles almost dreamily at me, making me even more uncomfortable than I already was. "I'm sure he'll be watching everyday just to see you." I don't smile this time, I just look down at my black-painted nails uncomfortably. "What do you do at home, dear?"

"As in a job?" I ask, getting a quick nod in response. Okay. This is a question I can answer. I take a deep breath and do my best at a half smile. "Oh, um . . . I sort fruits and vegetables at my local market. Well, the largest one, actually. We have many in District Eleven, but there's one main market that's the most expensive. I take in the loads, sort them, make up the signs and prices, that kind of stuff."

"How exciting!" Rookie exclaims. She appears to like me all right. It's a one-way sort of attraction, something that I know all too much about unfortunately. "Now, Vervain, before we must part, are there any last words you have for the live audience here tonight?" She asks, gesturing widely to the crowd in attendance.

I look expressionlessly into the eager crowd and smirk just a little. "To be honest I feel as though this whole arrangement is barbaric and wrong, but there is not one single tribute in this entire thing that will make it so I don't get home. Because I will by any means necessary. As awful and despicable as The Games are, I know that I'm stronger than them and the other tributes. Nothing is going to stop me from getting home to what and who I love. Nothing."

Rookie, a little speechless, smiles and tries to pick things up again. "Okay! Let's have a hand for District Eleven Tribute, Vervain Lehane!" The crowd applauds her words loudly as the buzzer goes off and I walks back behind the curtain to backstage, not giving the Capitol audience a single glance.


	2. First Day

After my stylist, Ash, dresses me in what I assume was this year's tribute outfit, or at least mine—brown pants that hung close to my legs, black leather boots that went up to just below my knee, a midnight blue blouse, and a long black jacket with shiny gold buttons—he does my light hair in a partial French braid and does his best to get some water in me. For a while I don't want to bother with it, but then I remember overhearing people in training talking about all the symptoms of dehydration. Sandpaper-dry tongue, fatigue, hallucinations. I quickly take the silver cup from him and take a large sip, setting it down on my hip afterward. Who knows what kind of arena I'm being forced into?

"You're stronger than them," Ash says, placing a light hand on my shoulder. I smile at him just for a second before I'm whisked away down a hallway, the cup taken from my hand and Ash scurrying behind us all.

I start taking deep breaths as I approach the Launch Room, trying not to start hyperventilating. I care little about first impressions at this point, but I don't think it would be good for my chances if the others see me struggling to gain a full breath.

The two Peacekeepers place me on top of a metal circle about twenty feet below the ground. I know it's going to be an agonizingly long ride up, so I clutch my bushel of light purple vervain flowers tightly. I was named after these for their beauty, so my mother tells me back home. Home. That's where I want to be; where I'm going to get. If anyone is going to win The Hunger Games, it's me, myself, and I. I have more important things than the Capitol to tend to back home, but I think of the riches and food that come along with being a victor. My little siblings might even get to taste their first piece of rye bread, a vastly expensive rarity in District Eleven. I've only had it once at my older sister's birthday last year.

My older sister. Jade Lehane. Named after the stone for it's lustrous green shine that went perfectly with her eyes. The one who gave me my vervain necklace for my twelfth birthday, saying that since my name could be in the reaping ball starting that year that I needed all the luck I could get, and vervain flowers hold a symbolism of luck in my family.

And then, of course, there's the rest of them—Rose and Fawn, my little twin sisters, Leo, my little brother and youngest sibling, and finally Willow, my mother who had Jade when she was two years younger than I am right now. I came three years later. And then five years later the twins, and then two years later Leo. The thought of the little ones and my mother, without my father, Jay, because he'd been redirected to District Twelve to work in their coal mines a long while ago, sitting around the television set provided to each home in Panem by the Capitol, watching the reaping and then my interview and now me rising up in my little capsule.

Almost as if on cue, a glass tube slides down around me and I look to Ash for reassurance. He touches his first three fingers to his lips and holds them out to me, sort of a salute of sorts in District Twelve. I smiled for what felt like the first time in ages. The pod begins the slow ascent into the arena, making my hands clammy with sweat. I continuously wipe them on my pants and do my best to stand tall. The force of going upward is forcing me to slouch a little, so it's an effort.

Finally, I feel a light breeze kick my hair up and sunlight touch my face. I look up, my eyes met by the color green all around.

"Welcome to The Hunger Games!" Rookie's voice rang through the stadium, making me start. I can't see her, but her voice is loud and clear, just like you're sitting beside her.

I look around and see a lush green forest and I can hear running water. The water intrigues me, so I look around quickly to try and assess where it's coming from. Behind me. We're in a circular clearing with the large, golden object smack dab in the center of it, with all twenty-eight of us circled a ways around it. The ground is lush with green grass and small white flowers are dotted around it. Forest at all sides. Within the golden object is all the supplies a tribute could ever need—water, food, weaponry. I decide to take my chances with a large red backpack near the front of it.

"Now, I will be the creator of all in this arena," Rookie says, her voice almost shaking the ground it's so loud. I swallow hard, finding that my throat is very dry.

A few, large enough for everyone to see, pictures of strange looking animals appear in front of what I can only assume is the Cornucopia I've heard so much about. I furrow my brow at the strange creatures, some of which are things I've seen before in nature but colored differently, and others I've never seen at all. "All these animals live here, and they will surprise you . . . they aren't as cuddly as they look!" Rookie pauses. "Aren't they cute? I made them myself!" she giggles. I roll my eyes at the voice.

"You will have sixty seconds before you may leave your platform, Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be _ever _in your favor!" Rookie says happily before the pictures of the strange animals disappear, leaving me to examine my opponents and where I need to go next . . . for the next sixty seconds before all hell breaks loose.

I look around, on either side of me being the girl from the Capitol and my other District Eleven tribute. I forgot their names long ago, but they look confident. Capitol tributes have a good reputation for being vicious, mean, and barbaric in The Games just to get ahead, not caring about human life or mercy. But I knew that if I were to win, I had to be just the same. Tuning my ears in and realizing that the count was already to forty-five, I readied myself, getting into a running stance—crouched down on my plate with the tips of my fingers just grazing the cold metal surface. Capitol Girl looked at me like I was a crazy person, but all I did was shrug in reply, seemingly making her angry. Great. I have an enemy already and The Games haven't hardly began.

When the count is down to thirty, I look to my right from my crouched position and see a small brunette girl—the District Seven tribute I met in training. She was nice; she showed me how to tie a proper knot and I showed her how to load a crossbow, should she need to. Our eyes meet for a split second and a vague smile appears on her face, clearly recognizing me. I think her name was Abigail. I smile back and look back at the Cornucopia, my eyes falling on a beautiful gold crossbow. I keep a straight face on as I look it over, accompanied by a full quiver of silver, deadly sharp arrows. And, luckily, it's right next to the red backpack. I bite my cheek to stop from smiling as the count is down to fifteen. In fifteen seconds I could die in an instant. In fifteen seconds I'm going to run up to the Cornucopia, grab the backpack and crossbow, and double back to where I hear the water coming from.

In ten seconds.

In five.

I lick my dry lips and close my eyes, waiting for the cannon to fire and for the knot to release in my stomach. When the cannon fires, I'm one of the first to bolt off of the platform. My small size has always allowed me to run faster than anyone I knew in my district, and apparently anyone else in here.

Once I approach the Cornucopia I'm already hearing death cries and sounds of violence. My eyes fall on the red backpack and I quickly sling it over my shoulders, looking around all the while for anyone who may want to off me. Just as I'm picking up the crossbow, I feel a pair of hands take me down by my shoulders. I let out a sharp cry of pain as I land on my shoulder. I turn around to see Capitol Girl trying to wrestle my pack off of me. The crossbow fell out of my hands when I fell, but it was still close to me and I know I'm not going to let this pack go, so I reach over and pick up the weapon and aim for Capitol Girl's temple. I thrust the crossbow forward, planning only to clunk her on the head to make her release me, but at the last split second I realize the crossbow was already loaded and the sharp arrow pierces the skin on her temple, stabbing her deep. My eyes wide, I scramble off of her and quickly I pick up the crossbow again, ripping out the arrow that just killed Capitol Girl along with it. I turn back to the quiver of arrows to see them being picked up by Abigail. I debate whether or not to kill her for them, but then I saw her without a weapon that needed arrows. She whips around and throws them to me, almost immediately being overtaken by a boy from District Five. I aim the bloody arrow at his throat and get a direct hit, the razor sharp arrow going clean through his throat and his limp body falling in a broken heap to the floor. I grab Abigail's hand and she picks up a small silver backpack as we double back to the source of the water. She's a fast runner as well, so we dart into the edge of the forest, not looking back and never releasing our hands. I wondered for a moment why exactly I took Abigail's hand and saved her, but then I remembered that she's one of the youngest here and couldn't possibly get through the bloodbath herself and desperately needed somebody to look out for her. And I would be that person.

We don't stop for a long time, but when we reach a small clearing Abigail finally collapses to her knees, her small silver pack falling to the grassy ground beside her. "I can't run as fast as you can," she tells me, looking up at me from her position on all fours. I crouch down beside her and think, _No, you can't. I'm not even tired_ _yet_. "Can we take a break?"

I smile. "Sure," I say. "It'll give me an opportunity to look through this thing." My voice strains as I slide the large pack off my shoulders. I set my weapon down beside me and set the pack in front of me. "Count the arrows, would you?"

"Okay," she says, taking the quiver in her hands and counting the arrows with her fingers, moving the ones she's counted to one side. I waited to inspect the backpack to see what sum she comes up with. She looks at me with a smile. "There are fifteen arrows here."

"Awesome," I say, taking the quiver and setting it back down. "Okay, let's see what's in this bad boy."

I open up the pack and take out the supplies one by one—a black sleeping bag, a single full water bottle and another empty one, a pack of dried fruit, a pack of beef jerky, a bottle of iodine for water purification, and an emergency poncho made of yellow plastic.

"Wow," Abigail says. "You got a good one."

"I did," I agree, examining the food products. I nod to her pack. "See what's in yours."

She unzips the silver pack—which was a few inches bigger in diameter than my hand—and pulls out a small silver whistle and a bountiful pack of trail mix made up of almonds, cashews, Brazil nuts, dried cherries, dried apple pieces, clusters of oats, and small colorful pieces of candy.

"What are these?" Abigail asks, taking out one of the candy pieces, this one blue. I look at it and shrug.

"I don't know, taste it," I say.

She pops the morsel in her mouth and her face lights up when she chews it. "That's good! Try one, Vervain." She says, handing me a red one. I take it, smiling at her remembrance of my name. I gently place the candy in my mouth and break the hard shell with my teeth, instantly recognizing the taste and texture.

"It's chocolate," I tell her, smiling. "I remember—my sister got a chocolate bar for her birthday at the market and she let us all have some. We even melted some of it down and spread it on toasted rye bread." I smiled at the memory, but then my smile faltered.

"Are you okay?" Abigail asks, putting away the trail mix as I put away my things.

"Yeah," I say a little too quickly. "I'm okay." I discover that my throat is too dry to swallow, so I take a very small sip of the water, barely making a dent in it. "Want some?" I hold the bottle out to the brunette in front of me.

"No, I'm okay," She shakes her head. "It's yours!"

"We're allies, aren't we, Abigail?" I ask, shaking the bottle a little. She smiles and her eyes twinkle at the mention of being allies. She takes the bottle and takes a short sip, enough to wet her mouth, before handing it back to me. "Okay, we need to find where that water's coming from." Abigail volunteered to carry the red pack so I could equip my quiver properly. "That's too heavy for you."

"I'm strong, Vervain," she says, easily slinging it over her shoulders. "I work out." She winks, signifying her joke. I smile and we continue on our way into the woods. We're kick started when we hear the ruffles of leaves behind us.

"Wait!" I hiss, grabbing Abigail's sleeve to stop her. I turn around to face the noise and see a couple leaves ruffling. "Idiot."

"What?" Abigail whispers.

"Shh," I say, taking a couple steps forward after loading the crossbow. I hold it up to the ruffling bushes and smirk a little. "C'mon. Come out, come out."

"Who is it?" Abigail whispers.

"No idea," I whisper back, taking another cautious step ahead.

For a second the pink color I saw made me think I saw the fox Rookie showed to us, but then I'm denied the pleasure of offing one of her precious creatures when I see brown hair emerge. I do remember seeing a pink back back in the Cornucopia! The girl crawls out from under a bush, looking in the opposite direction from where Abigail and I are. Abigail hides behind me, although as tall as I am. She's still five years younger than I am, and I have sisters her age. I see symbolism in Abigail for the first time and widen my stance, protecting her from the crawling girl. I take aim and fire, making a clear shot in the back of the girl's head. She drops instantly, evidently dead. I walk carefully up to her, Abigail still behind me, and crouch down next to her. It's the girl from District Three. I remember her name being Sage because everybody talked about her.

"Is she dead?" Abigail asks, coming out from behind me. I nod.

"Yeah," I say. "She's dead." The weight of killing three people hits me hard and I almost fall to the forest floor, but I recollect myself as quick as I can, knowing that it was for Abigail's safety and mine. And it's not my fault that Sage was dumb enough to come out of the bushes with a bright pink backpack without disguising it in dirt and leaves first. "Oh, check her pack." I point to it, wondering what could possibly be in it.

Abigail tentatively crouches down to touch the pack, although quickly standing back up. "I don't think I can do it, Vervain. She's dead, and . . ."

"It's okay," I say, rubbing her shoulder. "I'll do it."

I crouch down and slide Sage's arms through the straps, letting the back fall to the ground. I unzip it, finding little of practical use except for a small flashlight and a small canteen. "All right," I sigh, discovering a small clip on the canteen and clipping it onto my belt so it rested on my hip.

"You're just gonna take her stuff?" Abigail asks, more curious than appalled.

"Yes," I answer. "It's not as if she has any use for it anymore." I do a final round of the pack and find nothing else I can use, so I put the flashlight into the red pack on Abigail's back and pick up my crossbow. "Let's go find that water."

After a while, I was feeling like my ears were deceiving me. It had been well over a couple hours of walking and frugally snacking on trail mix and tiny sips of water and we still hadn't found a thing. It wasn't until we sat down on a boulder to rest when I saw it—one of the animals Rookie showed us.

"Vervain," Abigail says, "I'm really tired and the sun's almost down. Can we sleep?"

"Soon," I promise, standing up. "You stay here, okay?" After I take a step forward, I look back at her and shake my head. "No, you're coming with me." I take her wrist and pull her up, not willing to leave her alone in the near nighttime.

Ignoring her complaint, I load my crossbow and inch towards the creature. It was a small horse-like thing with black stripes. It had a slight blue tint to it and a pink mane. It was beautiful and I tip my hat to Rookie for her creativeness, but it must go. She herself said that these things are dangerous. I raise my crossbow and take aim at it's head. I make the shot and it falls to the forest floor. When it falls, I hear a little splash and my ears perk up.

"Did you hear that?" I whisper to Abigail.

"Hear what?" she yawns.

"The splash," I say, pulling her beside me as I walk up to the animal, still visible in the slight daylight we have left.

I approach the animal and almost squeal when I see what its back hoof had landed in. A pond. A gorgeous, large pond with sparkling water trickling in from a stream and off of the rocks surrounding it. A smile spreads across my face and I look at Abigail. "I think we found our water."

Finding that it was too dark to fill up our containers now, Abigail finds a steady, wide tree a couple yards from the pond as I move the animal out of the water. Even though we have iodine, which would kill off any bacteria the animal leaves in the water, I don't want to take any chances. I push it over to a tree and brush my hands off on my pants before I notice a thick, silver liquid coming from its head where I shot it. Blood. I examine it, dipping the very tip of my middle finger in it and looking at its sparkly, shimmering quality in the ever-diminishing sunlight. This animal, whatever it is, is far from any kind of normal I thought I may encounter here.

"Vervain!" Abigail whisper calls. I look back, wiping my fingers on the grass as I look at her. "I found a fork in this tree we can sleep in."

"Cool," I say, standing up and walking over to the tree. It had branches that were easy to climb up and I could see the fork she pointed out. I smile. "Can you climb trees?"

"I have been my entire life," Abigail says, smiling.

We both climb up with ease into the tree, putting all of our supplies into the foot of the sleeping back and positioning it on the fork.

"Are you okay with sharing?" I ask. Abigail nods and we position ourselves back-to-back after securing ourselves into the high tree with both of our belts tied together, sharing body heat quite efficiently. We watch the sky as the Capitol emblem appears and the anthem plays. They show the faces of those killed today. I mostly just recognize Capitol Girl, the boy from District Five, whose names I suppose were Alia and Fabian, which I deciphered from them showing the names of the tributes under their pictures, and Sage. The other eleven who died today I recognized but didn't want to bother with.

Right after the sky went dark again, Abigail fell asleep. I smiled, snuggling into the sleeping bag and pulling it up to my chin, forever looking out at the ground bellow. I've survived day one of The Hunger Games. I've killed three and saved one. And now, all I can hope is that I'll save myself tomorrow.


	3. Attack of Rookie's Creation

Fourteen of us are left. I saw all of their faces in my nightmares. From what has been said in the past by victors of The Hunger Games, the nightmares typically do not occur until the real violence has begun. But those fourteen faces, especially the three that I killed, weave their way into my dreams our first night in that tree, high above the ground and, ideally, out of any danger. But no matter how high off the ground I convince myself I am, whether it be a few inches or miles, they still show their innocent, plain faces. With their faces come their names. I remember them from the death toll and the reapings.

Axel from 1. Gladielle and Kai from 2. Sage from 3. Sundari, who was only twelve, and Fabian from 5. Dillion from 7. Connor from 8. Devon from 9. Ivory from 10. Both of twelve's tributes, Eve and Justin are gone as well. And then, to top it all off, Jace from 13 and Alia from The Capitol. Three of them dead because of me. Three families shattered into a million pieces because of the loss of their children, their siblings, because of my hands.

I remember that if I had died, my family would be also. My family comes first. I can't have what happened to my sister happen to me. Sure, she wasn't in The Games, she had been overcome with syphilis, but all the same, she died. And I couldn't. My mother is plenty capable to take care of herself, but supply food and keep shelter for three kids on her own without father there to support her? There's not a chance.

I wake first before Abigail that morning. After I wake her, we collect ourselves and make a meal out of a little trail mix and dried fruit. We gather our belongings and make the groggy descent down the tree. Neither of us knows a lot about the other, but we manage to become closer after a couple hours of purifying water from the pond and seeing if that horse thing is good to eat. Abigail knows a thing or two about hunting and animals, and she deems that, due to the chilly cold of last night, that it would be just fine to skin and eat. Since I know nothing about skinning a horse, albeit it's not fully a horse, she takes a sharp rock and begins cutting away at the skin while I go to collect some firewood, getting queasy at the sight of the blue-tinted striped skin separating from the shimmery, light pink flesh of the creature.

I wrap my jacket around my waist, finding that the air is muggier than yesterday and a little hotter as well. Probably one of Rookie's sick tricks to throw us off our game. But I refuse to let the heat get to me as I search the thick brush for something remotely useful. The problem is, though, that the humidity has given everything, including astray logs, a slight damp feeling. Unusable. It's almost as if these logs were strategically placed here to psych me out, knowing that I would try to gather wood for a fire to cook the horse thing, and at the same time made everything wet. I'm scowling at a two-foot long log as I crouch at its side when it happens.

It's as if someone had turned the lights off in the arena, which I assume is what basically happened. The sky suddenly turns pitch black, no stars or moon to be seen, and everything around me fades into darkness. I can't hardly see past my own nose, as if I'm inside of a void world where only blackness exists, as if I'm drifting through space before space existed. I feel as though I'm floating in the nothingness until the Capitol emblem casts its light upon me, reminding me that I'm alive. After a moment, my eardrums are assaulted by a nasal, accented voice raining down from the sky.

"Are we ready?" The familiar voice takes over my ears, making me clutch my fists and shut my eyes in an attempt to ignore the splitting volume of the question. The screen brightens up and I see Rookie's face looking down at me, making me cringe. "Hello, everyone!" she giggles. "I hope you are all doing well! What vigorous first day we've had!" She giggles again, giving me a sudden urge to punch her in the nose. I can't tell why I'm so angry, but I haven't the time for her at the moment. "I have a surprise for you!" She claps her hands and the camera zooms out, showing Rookie standing in the creator's room. I narrow my eyes in curiosity. She _is _the head Gamemaker, so to speak, but I still wondered. "May I?" she asks one of the Gamemakers. He nods and she takes something out of the extravagant purse she had been carrying. She places it on the screen and taps it multiple times. "Good luck to you all! And happy Hunger Games!" She laughs before the screen fizzles out.

I'm relieved when the sun returns and light once again illuminates the fauna, allowing me to see again. I look around to see if Rookie's changed anything, but nothing appears to be happening. I bite my lip and tentatively walk ahead a few steps, looking over my shoulder and to my sides all the while. I remind myself that I am a tribute in The Hunger Games from the second poorest district in Panem; no one will want to see me win. Therefore, I must be more careful than the others from the higher districts. The sponsors will obviously adhere to the Capitol and 1 tributes. If I get attacked, injured, or run out of food and water, no one will be eagerly standing by with a wad of cash waiting to revive me. So whatever Rookie just did, could bring forth my final seconds in The Games.

Soon I hear a couple sticks break. Snapping like weakened bones, crunching loudly and accompanied by the sounds of crumbling leaves. I stop immediately, trying to identify the source of the sounds. No doubt one of Rookie's creations preparing to rear its ugly head. A few more snappings and something that sounded like a bush's leaves being ruffled, and then I catch a glimpse of a bright yellow object emerging from the bushes. I lean forward to get a closer look and see that it's a large cat with spots dotting its body. Its body hangs close to the ground as it stalks me, its bright pink eyes locked on mine. My mouth hangs slightly open, my breathing shaky and uncoordinated. I back up a little, but that only makes the cat take a couple quicker steps ahead, which makes my heart stop every time. I feel a drop of sweat trickle down my cheek and fall onto my arm.

"Vervain!" I hear Abigail call from about thirty yards behind me. I want to shout at her to be quiet and stop trampling through the leaves and underbrush, in a situation as stressful as this one sounding like a hurricane blowing through the arena, but then I would defeat my own purpose. I look back at her quickly to see that she's jogging quickly. I wave my hand back at her while my eyes are locked on the cat's mysterious pink eyes, making her footfalls few and far between. "Vervain? Are you okay?"

"Rookie," is all I say. She lets out a small gasp when she sees what I see. The large cat is practically crawling its way towards me as I slowly stumble backward.

"Is this what she . . ." Abigail whispers before I cover her mouth with my hand. I nod.

I drop my voice to a very low whisper right next to her. "When I say run, I want you to run as fast as you can back to camp, okay? Then I want you to load my crossbow and get it ready for me, all right?"

"I don't know how to load a crossbow," she muffles from under my trembling hand. The cat lets out a low, throaty growl at us, baring its sharp white teeth.

"It's easy," I say hurriedly. "Just do your best, okay? I'll hold it off."

She only nods and begins walking quickly to make sure the cat's eyes are on me, not her. When it is established that she is of little interest to the beast, she takes off quickly towards our makeshift campsite. I keep my eyes locked on the cat, walking backwards progressively more quickly. I lean down to my side and feel around for something to throw for a moment until I find a rock about the size of my palm. I pick it up and throw it a few yards behind the cat, the sound of it landing it a bush making it look behind itself. The second it turns away from me, I run.

I look behind myself briefly, seeing that the cat is in quick persuit of me. Ducking and weaving through the dense collection of trees, it's an effort to keep my feet from catching on the rocks and roots that lie waiting on the forest floor. I look behind me again and let out a slight yelp at how close the cat is now. Whatever it is, it's faster than I am. Far faster.

When I finally reach camp, I find that Abigail is just finishing loading up the crossbow when I need it. I can load a crossbow faster than anybody I've ever seen load one, just about as fast as a master archer could load a plain bow. I think that's part of why the cameras are most likely locked on us right about now.

I skid to a stop, making deep scratches in the earth below my boots, and rip the crossbow from Abigail's hands. I don't take time to aim, the arrow piercing the skin in the cat's hind leg. It falls to the ground as I load another arrow, aiming for its eye. It lets out a pained growl as it dies. I see that the blood pouring from its leg and eye are of the same silver, glittery quality of the horse thing's blood. I extract the two arrows and clean them in the pond as Abigail just looks at it.

"What is it?" she asks.

"Don't know," I answer, starting when a cannon interrupts me. A tribute has just died, quite possibly by the hands of the creature that nearly just killed me. As I put the arrows back in my quiver, I turn and see that Abigail is clutching her hand against her abdomen. "Are you okay?"

"No." She shakes her head. "I cut my hand loading your crossbow." She winces as she reveals a cut about two inches long across her palm. I jump up, leaving my weaponry on the smooth rocks that line the pond, and take her hand in mine.

I shook my head, examining the cut. "You need a bandage. This could get infected really fast."

"Think the sponsors are listening?" she laughs. I don't laugh. I've seen cuts like these before, and while minor, they can get worse faster than they can get better. "Maybe we can convince them to send down some medicine or something."

"How do you figure we do that?" I ask, pushing my hair out of my face as I look around, curious as to what can be used as a bandage.

"I don't know," she says. "Play the helpless act?"

"That never works," I sigh, taking her gently by her wrist and leading her to the pond. "First we should rinse it out."

Abigail holds her hand down at the edge of the water and I start by pouring handfuls of water on the cut, dabbing it dry with the hem of my cotton shirt between rinses. Once it appears to be no more than a thin red line across her palm, still leaking a little blood but nothing much, she keeps her hand in a fist and winces every now and again at the stinging sensation it brings.

"It hurts," she says, shaking her head. It's now that I realize how not ready for this she is. She's just a child at thirteen, behaving just as my little sisters do when they get a cut or a bruise. I look at her for a long while, seeing only my sisters with their long dark hair and chocolate brown eyes with flecks of green in them from our father. I snap out of it when Abigail shakes my shoulder, no longer in front of me, but at my side. "Vervain, are you all right?"

I nod. "Yes. Yes, I'm all right—"

Another cannon. Two dead today alone. I shut my eyes, thinking of two more families that have to go without a loved one for the rest of their lives.

"Should I finish skinning the horse . . . thing?" she asks, nodding to the dead animal about a yard away from us. I shake my head.

"No, I'll do it," I say, waving her off. "Go sit by the water. Periodically rinse out your hand when it starts to sting again."

"Does that help?" She walks over to the pond and sits on a big rock, crossing her ankles.

"Does for me."

The next hour or two we sit in silence with no further disturbances. I manage to get a couple flanks out of the horse thing and we find some kindling around the campsite. We come up lucky on a couple dry logs that we pile up for a fire. Before getting started, I rip off a piece of the hem of my shirt to wrap around her hand, for fear that the dirt on the sticks might infect it; she protests, but I ignore her has I tie the ends together at the back of her hand. We use a method of fire-starting Abigail was taught by a friend back in 7 involving a smooth stone and a stick about a foot and a half long. Actually, we try it for a long time before we get even a little smoke. And then a little longer than before until we get a spark that sets the kindling aflame.

"Yes!" Abigail cheers under her breath, pumping her not-injured fist in the air. I smile briefly at her happiness before putting one of the bigger logs onto the flame, careful not to smother it of oxygen. "Aren't you afraid of smoke, Vervain?"

"I guess," I say, looking at the curlicues of smoke twisting and contorting from the wood. "But anyone who'd like to visit us is completely welcome." I gather some small rocks and line the sizzling fire with them. "These should keep it confined to this area."

"You seem to know a lot about fires." Abigail's words sound sarcastic, but they're accompanied by a light smirk. I return it and shrug.

"I suppose," I say. "I know enough." Then I start to think of a way to cook the flanks, currently resting on a rock near the pond. Their fairly sizable, enough so that Abigail and I could each have two halves sparingly. Then, an idea hits me. I bring the flanks over and set them on the emergency poncho, taking one and shoving a stick rinsed in the pond into it length-wise. I hold it over the fire.

"Should be ready in no time." I shrug nonchalantly at Abigail, making her laugh. She does the same with the other flank and sticks it over the fire.

After a while, the light meat cooks through nicely. We ignore out tired arms to admire the golden brown quality of it. Aside from the edges being a little burnt, it's perfect. We tear them into two halves, each taking two. I take the first bite.

"How is it . . .?" Abigail asks, keeping a close eye on my face.

Although the bite was small and cautious, the taste of the meat is bountiful. Almost fruity. The texture is similar to that of chicken—I've had it only once in my lifetime, and it was years ago, but I still remember it—but a little more oily. It goes down easy and doesn't come back up immediately. If Rookie had made anything poisonous, she wouldn't have made the people watching at home around Panem wait for the results.

"It's good, try some." I nod and watch as she rips off a chuck and pops it into her mouth.

"For day-old meat this isn't bad for a second-day . . ." She looks up at the sky and, through the canopy of leaves, we both judge that the time is about one in the afternoon, going by the sun's current position. ". . . lunch."

We continue our feast of horse and water. We nickname the horse thing Zebra. Abigail learned about ancient creatures called Zebras that looked just like what we're eating right now. It sounds ridiculous to me, but who am I to judge our ancestors?

We purify some water after finishing off our halves of Zebra. We wrap up the other halves in the poncho and put them in my backpack. I start when I notice how much smoke our fire has generated.

"Whoa," Abigail says, looking over the fire as she continues to clutch her painful hand.

"We need to put this out," I say, opening up Sage's canteen and positioning it over the fire.

"Won't that just generate more smoke?"

"It'll be better than just letting it roar on," I say, emptying the canteen over the fire. Sure enough, more smoke angrily spat out at us, but it died down okay in a couple minutes. "I think—"

"Stop! Shut up!" I hear hushed hisses coming from the bushes and scramble to pick up my weapons. Abigail painfully clutches her small silver back as we duck behind a pair of bushes a couple yards away from the fire. I was sure the voices were those I heard in training . . . those taunting, cocky, arrogant voices that suggested the bodies attached to them could do anything. Capitol Guy and Annabelle from District 1. Careers. "I'm sure I heard them here. I smell meat."

"Think they were here?" Capitol Guy says this. I peak over the bushes to see them emerging with careful footfalls into our clearing.

"No, those dead animals started that fire," Annabelle says, walking with purpose up to the scene. It's obvious that somebody was here. Two dead animals, one skinned and picked mostly clean, and a recently put-out fire? They'd be stupid to doubt it.

"Sorry," Capitol Guy mumbles.

Abigail and I flatten ourselves out on the ground, holding our breath. The Careers talk some more, argue mostly. They are just deciding to take up camp here when Abigail lets out a yelp of pain. I clamp my hand over her mouth and see that the makeshift bandage had hiked up around her wrist and sharp pine needles had stabbed her cut. I cut my eyes and keep my head down, hoping that the Careers' silence was influenced by something else. However, when I hear footsteps nearing our horrible hiding place, I roll over on my back and load my crossbow.

Turning my head to Abigail, I whisper, "We have to run."

Without protest, she nods, tears forming in her eyes from the pain in her hand. I take a quick look at it and see that a couple needles are protruding from it. I wince, too, and ready myself for flight. Knowing our cover has already been blown, when the footsteps are a heart attack-inducing couple feet away from us, I link arms with Abigail and yell, "RUN!"

We spring up to our feet and take off into the forest, hearing shouts of protest from the Careers behind us. Darting through the trees and underbrush, the four of us are the prime attention of the cameras. Abigail is constantly looking behind her at the Careers, their dispositions terrifying to her. She's far too young to be dealing with this, so I push myself to run faster to save her. Annabelle's fiercely red hair glimmers in the sunlight, contrasting with Capitol Guy's dark brown hair and muscular figure. They're intimidating, but far from enough to stop me.

But a tree is just enough.

Without warning, a slim tree crashes in front of us, nearly crushing us under its weight. Undoubtedly the work of the Gamemakers. Abigail is perplexed, but I don't have time to be. I yank her to the right just as the Careers catch up to us. The terrain gets a little rocky, but I have no problem maneuvering it. Abigail, on the other hand, gets her foot caught on a couple rocks. It's frustrating, but I do my best not to drag her along the sharp rocks on her face.

Suddenly, I hear a sickening _smack! _on the rocks behind me. I look being to see that Career Guy's ankle had caught in between two rocks and he'd fallen. Annabelle screeches to a stop, flailing her arms at her sides to keep her balance. The good in Abigail and me make us stop and look back at him.

"Jayden!" Annabelle yells, jogging back over to him. "Get the hell up! Jayden!"

"I can't!" Jayden wails, trying to get his twisted ankle out of the rocks. Then, he sees something behind Annabelle and his eyes widen like dinner plates. "Annabelle, look out!"

His pained cry makes Annabelle whip around, her bright red hair swishing around in a perfect wave. The moment she faces the source of Jayden's terror, she's taken down by her shoulders by the very catlike creature I killed earlier today. The animal clenches its teeth down on Annabelle's chest, causing a blood-curdling scream to emanate from her lips. Before either of us see more, Abigail and I stumble back into a sprint. It's not long until we hear a cannon. Annabelle. We climb higher, not stopping until we reach a clearing. We must have been running a long time since the sun has moved considerably. Maybe the Gamemakers just want to see the death tally sooner rather than—

Another cannon.

"They're both dead," I say, plopping down on a boulder, catching my breath.

"That cat killed them both?" Abigail asks, sitting on the soft ground next to me. I nod. "Wow."

"I know it," I say, wiping the sweat from my forehead with my jacket sleeve. "That's one way to give my family a heart attack." My words were spiteful, but I ended up smiling a little bit.

"Same here," Abigail says, slowly inspecting her cut. She takes out the needless and applies pressure to it. "Think it'll get infected?"

"Not if you rinse it some more," I say, taking a water bottle out of the back pack and pouring just enough on the cut to rinse it out a little.

We eat a couple small handfuls of trail mix, leaving only a quarter of the bag left, and look for a tree to spend the night. It's not nighttime yet, but we figure we should be getting as much sleep as possible.

We set up camp in a fork of branches in a sturdy tree and lie there.

"Do you really think we can both make it through this, Vervain?" Abigail asks me after a long, long time of silence. The stars are just beginning to show their faces through the deep orange and purple sky.

I don't answer right away. The fact of the matter is, one of us will die in these Games. No matter how you spin it, one of us will die. But neither of us wants to, obviously, so what's to do about our little alliance?

"I . . . no," I answer evenly. I look at her and see that her eyes are unblinking, staring straight through me. "No. Not both of us." We both turn back to the sky and I interlock my fingers with hers. "But I promise to keep you as safe as I can."

"Me, too," she says back, giving my hand a reassuring squeeze.

Tears threaten to pour out of my eyes, so I turn my head away and close them quickly, trying hard to regulate my breathing.

After a while, the Capitol emblem appears in the sky and, after the anthem, so do the faces of those lost today in order.

Rosemary Rodgers – District 9

Shane Woods – District 6

Annabelle Jenkins – District 1

Jayden Devengal – Capitol

Eighteen down . . . . . . ten to go.


	4. They're More Vicious Than They Look

"This is ridiculou—OW!"

"Shh!" I snapped, tightly gripping Abigail's wrist. "Don't draw attention to us! Please."

When we woke up this morning via a cannon shot in the distance, in the dim morning light I could see tiny red lines coming from the cut on her wrist. Apparently her getting dirt and pine needles in it did some considerable damage. Early-staged blood poisoning. I know because I've seen a bounty of people back in 11 with it. They'd get a deep cut on a branch from one of the trees in the orchard or get bitten by on of the native pests and boom. Their body is a ticking time bomb. I hurried her down from the tree and drenched it in water, scrubbing and doing my best at medicating it. If this goes on, she could loose her hand or even die . . . no. I wouldn't allow it.

"I don't see how water is going to help," Abigail says weakly, somehow more sensible than me. Blood poisoning doesn't typically take this long, but Rookie has done some awful things to us so far, why not throw a fatal disease in there, too?

"It's gonna have to," I say, keeping my eyes on the cut, running my thumb over it repeatedly, half hoping that the red would wipe away. But it never did.

"Vervain." Abigail says my name with urgency, tapping my outer thigh with the back of her hand. I look up and she nods a ways away. When I follow her gaze, I see another one of those zebras. "It's another one."

"Should have expected as much," I mumbled. "I can't tell why Rookie's allowing us so much food. The bags were loaded, we still have a little zebra left."

"Should we shoot it?" she asks, shrugging her bony shoulders. For a moment when I look at her, she looks . . . thirteen. So young and vulnerable. I decide right there and then that, at least for the duration of The Hunger Games, Abigail Turner is my little sister. Through the lacy shadows provided by the canopy of leaves above our heads, the sunlight gleams on her bright green eyes. Almost the exact same hue as Jade's eyes, they fuel me.

"Suppose it can do more harm than good just standing around like that." I let go of Abigail's hand and pick up my crossbow, already loaded, and get a clean shot through the zebra's throat. It falls to the ground with a loud thwack.

"I'm gonna go take a look at it," Abigail says, standing up from her crouched position and cradling her hand close to her body. I want to disagree, tell her to stay here and rest, but it's unlikely my sponsors, given that I have any at all, will want or have enough money to send me some proper medicine. So it's best that she get as much time to explore as she can. I follow behind her lazily, crossbow in hand, as she trots down to the zebra. "You really got it good. It's practically gushing."

I close my eyes for a moment, disgusted, before I compose myself and nod. "Yeah."

Abigail kneels down next to the creature and, without thinking, runs her infected hand down the its neck. I go to lunge forward when it touches the silver, sparkly blood, but she jerks away before I can. She exclaims a disgusted noise before sighing what sounded like a sigh of relief.

"That feels . . . good," she says, looking down at her hand. When I kneel down beside her and turn her hand over, we both gasp at the red lines retreating.

Before she can tell me to, I dip my two forefingers in the blood and practically slam them down on her cut. As I rub it in, ignoring the fact that I'm rubbing zebra blood on my ally's injured hand, she actually smiles. I keep massaging it in until it's no longer visible, absorbed by the injury. When my hand comes away from hers, her palm in spotless.

"Whoa," she whispers, running her thumb over where the cut used to be. "It doesn't even hurt now."

"Whoa," I echo, shaking my head. I look at my fingers, stained with glitter. Then my eyes turn to the zebra. "We should take some of its blood. To have. Just in case."

Abigail nods in agreement and we take Sage's canteen, already empty anyway, and do our best at getting the thick silvery liquid into it. It takes us a while, but we eventually can ignore the smell of death and fill up our canteen as much as possible. We still relish in Abigail's healed hand.

I smile. "It's a miracle."

"I guess Rookie isn't so bad after all." Her statement is sarcastic, but it's almost comical how quickly the sky turns dark and I'm again lost in that void of blackness, not knowing which way is right or left, up or down. I almost fall backward when the screen in the sky lights up with Rookie's face. Again.

I can see her whole body, her attire somewhat like that of the interviews only more puffy and unflattering, only now she is holding a small animal, somewhat resembling a dog. I get a pang of something in my gut, knowing what's coming next. I hope that I don't.

Her eyes are flared with anger as she stares into the camera. "Hello, all," she giggles maliciously. I hate her laugh with a burning passion. A scowl paints its way across my face at her breezy expression. How can she possibly be so calm? But after all, she's on the safe side of things. "This is Snowy." She pets the little animal and it licks her hand, making her giggle some more. "Snow is going to come and take some revenge," she spits at us, "because _you _killed my poor helpless kittens!" She is on the verge of sobbing but quickly cleans herself up. I roll my eyes, probably over dramatically. "Anyway." She clears her throat and shakes her head a little, making her candy floss curls bounce. I've only had candy floss once, and her hair reminded me so much of it. It looked delicious. "This will be your next challenge, because from now on, I will NOT be going easy on you." She says 'not' very sharply, making my ears throb. She giggles before placing Snowy on the Gamemakers map.

Duplicates of it fill the screen and she sent them down after pressing a few buttons. I make a momentary fool of myself by looking around for the dogs, but everything is pitch black.

"Happy Hunger Games to all, and may the odds be _ever _in your favor!"

The small doglike animal barks and its razor sharp teeth are exposed. The screen goes black and the sun makes a reappearance. I can hear far-off barking, probably the dogs for the other eight tributes.

Almost immediately I can hear a cannon shoot off, signaling another death. That's two in the morning hours alone.

Suddenly, I hear a rustling from the bushes, and it emerges. A dog with a pelt a rainbow of colors ranging from pastel blue to deep pink, and about twice the size of the dog Rookie was holding.

"That's not very fair," Abigail says, taking her small silver bag in her hand and taking my arm with her other. "What—" She's cut off by the dog barking a throaty bark and snarling at us, making her jump and bring herself closer to me. With one swift movement of my arm, I get her completely behind me.

"Stay close to me, Abigail," I say, backing up slightly and slowly reloading my crossbow. Its gold body shines in the sunlight, glimmering magically.

"You can call me Abby," she says meekly from behind me. I inwardly smile and plan to call her just that when we're out of this.

Suddenly, the dog lunges at us and I fire, making a deep red line down the dog's back. This animal, whatever it's supposed to be, had normal blood. Unhealing.

The dog it momentarily fazed and I take the opportunity to reload, but as soon as it's loaded, it lunges again. And this time I don't have time to aim, so I grab the sleeve of Abigail's jacket and dart into the trees. I can hear barking behind us and I know that we're being pursued. We behind to go down a leafy hill, stumbling on roots and trying hard to recompose ourselves without stopping. Almost as soon as we reach a flat surface, packed down dirt—almost in a trail of sorts—with a few leaves scattered around it, I hear the scream. It's a loud, high-pitched female scream coming from our right. I dart in the direction of it once I hear the dog bark from behind us, dragging Abigail along with me. I catch a glimpse of a large bush to hour left and push her towards it.

"What are you—"

I cut her off with, "Shh! Just hide. I'll be back."

She obeys my orders and crawls underneath the bush, allowing me to run ahead towards the voice. Ahead of me, I see blonde hair waving around in the air and immediately recognize the girl from District Six. Trinity. In training she offered to help me with archery, thinking that I was new at it. Boy, I showed her up. But now, both our lives in the hands of Rookie's mutts, it looks like we'll have to band together, at least for the moment.

I run up to her and shoot the dog in the head. Her jaw drops as it falls to her feet. She looks up at me from her position on the ground and her eyes don't hold thanks or appreciation, they hold anger and resentment.

"I can handle myself!" she spits at me, her words full of venom. I'm so offended by her that I almost forget that I had a dog chasing me, too. I'm afraid that it found Abigail until I see it rushing up to me. I try to load my crossbow but my fingers slip and the silver arrow falls to the ground.

I'm knocked to the ground. The air is knocked out of me as I land on my back. I'm wrestling with the dog to get off of me but it's not working. I'm keeping its teeth from piercing my skin, but only barely. I scream and shout for Trinity to help me, but she only stands there, watching on. She has a red scratch on her forehead that accents her blonde hair and brown eyes and makes her look tough. She's standing with her legs wide-spread and her bow in her hand, her quiver resting loyally on her back.

Suddenly, the dog makes a funny noise and drops down onto me, an arrow in its head. I breathe heavily as I push it off of me. After I stand, picking up my crossbow and fallen arrow, I look up to see Trinity's arrow pointed directly at my face. She looks at me with daggers and spits out, "You'd better run."

I do. I run. I run past her and lift my red backpack, which I'd offered to carry a while ago, up to guard my head. An arrow pierces its rough, red surface just as I'm nearing Abigail's bush. I look behind me to see Trinity running behind me, trying to reload as she does. I rip the arrow out of the backpack and take aim, coiling it behind my head. I throw it as hard as I can in a straight line, and it gets Trinity straight in the eye. She wasn't that far away from me, so it wasn't that great a feat, but I feel proud of myself. She falls to the ground and her arrows spill to the ground. I plan to take them once I find Abigail. I run over to the bush and find her, mouth agape, staring at me.

"What the hell do you call that?" she asks, emerging out from under the bush.

I let a breathless smile cross my face as I rub a patch of dirt from my cheek, only smearing it more. Trinity's cannon goes off, and a moment after, so does another one. I breathe, "I call it aggressive negotiations."

Ricky Snow – District 13

Wendy – District 10

Trinity Lee – District 6

Devon Fytir – District 3


	5. Partners and Wolves

"Okay . . . now all you need to do is aim and pull the trigger."

"What if I don't hit it, though?"

"Then we'll start again until you do.

In the soft light of dawn, Abigail looked like a princess. Her subtle features overcast by the shadows, her green eyes focused on her target. I'm teaching Abigail to shoot crossbow; have been since we got up. She expressed interest after our encounter with the cat a couple days ago.

I look over her shoulder as she takes aim at the owl we'd spotted a while ago. It was bright, bright yellow and had a ghostly blue beak. It was a difficult target for a first time shooter, but I figured she should dive in head-first if she ever wanted to get really good at this. I could hit the bird no problem dead in its eye—it's the cleanest way to get a kill—from twenty yards away, but I didn't know about Abigail.

She pulls the golden trigger and the silver arrow goes flying. I follow it intently as it catches on the owl's wing, startling it and making it quickly fly away. I smile, but Abigail shakes her head at herself.

"I missed," she sighs.

"You did better than I did my first time!" I say, patting her on the back. "You still hit it. I'm pretty sure you knocked off a couple feathers." I push myself up from my crouched position on the ground and jog over to collect the arrow. There, I find two yellow feathers next to its silver head. "I was right!"

I return to a sulking Abigail and hold one of the feathers up to her face. She looks up and says, "What is that?"

"It's a feather, obviously," I say, opening her hand and putting it in hers. "In case we ever get separated, leave it pointing in the direction you've gone. Okay? Then I can find you. I'll do the same."

"Why?"

Why. Yes, why? It's an old system with partners in the orchards in Eleven. I bite my lower lip, thinking of the few times I was partners with my friend Lucy in the apple orchards. We would always carry around feathers with us to point in the directions we went so each other would know where the other was.

"It's an Eleven thing," I answer, closing her hand around the feather. I smile at her and let out a long breath. "Okay. So, let's get back on this horse, shall we?" I pick up the golden crossbow and begin to reload it.

"I can't do this," Abigail says, sitting down cross-legged. "It's too hard."

I look at her incredulously. "You've shot it once, Abby."

"I know that," she says back. "I'm aware of how many times I've shot it."

"Then you should also be aware of how many _more _times you're gonna have to shoot it before you get good at it." I finish loading it, a little slower do to the still-present early morning grogginess.

"Okay, fine." She looks at me then as I'm handing her the crossbow. "You're like a big sister to me, Vervain." I blink at her, surprised by her confession. "I mean, we've only known each other for a few days, but . . . you've treated me like I'm family."

"Well . . . sure," I say. I've never told her how much symbolism she holds to me. Or how much I like her based on just herself.

"Thanks," she says. "For everything. I couldn't have chosen a better ally than you. I'm sorta glad you spilled paint on me in the camouflage section of training now." She says it with a laugh.

My stomach felt warm and fuzzy as I recalled the memory. We were both in the Training Center working on camouflage. I ended up, of course, knocking over a pale of gray-green paint on her. Assuming she'd be furious with me, I apologized a thousand times as I tried to clean her up, but she just laughed. And then I laughed. And we were like that for awhile. I smile at her as she sets down the crossbow to drink some water now. I shake my head to myself, thinking, _How am I ever going to come out of this?_

Once again, the arena goes pitch black as we're standing up. Out of alarm, I paw around for the red pack, finally finding it directly behind me on a rock. I hold my crossbow, poised for the kill, as a spotlight shines down on myself and Abigail. The light is bright and blinding, so I have to blink a few times in order to see Abigail's scared face. She's gripping her silver pack tightly, looking around in all directions out of panic. I was more calm, looking around swiftly, searching for any signs of attackers. But then I notice more spotlights off in the distance and realize the other tributes have been far closer than I'd thought this whole time.

Suddenly the ground is now longer beneath me and I'm suspended high in the air. I feel like I'm falling and floating at the same time and don't know what to do. I look to my left to see Abigail in the same situation, practically hyperventilating.

"Vervain!" Abigail screams my name, kicking and flailing her arms around. I look over at her and feel sorry for her, so scared. "Vervain!"

"Abby! Stay calm!"

I sling the backpack over my shoulder and keep my crossbow steady in my right hand. I calm myself only for a split second before I'm jolted around like a ragdoll. I let out a sharp yelp as my crossbow slips a little. I quickly regain composure of it and look around some more, waiting for Rookie to make her next move. When she does, I'm rushed through the treeline and watching the tops of trees rush past me. In an instant, I collide with another airborne tribute back-to-back. I recognize her as Reina Alkress, the girl from District Four. She was nice to me in training; helped me with knives.

I then feel cold metal on my left wrist. When I look down I see that we've been handcuffed together. She's about to protest when we're again, flying through the cold, biting air. Eleven must be getting a kick out of this.

We're all flung to the cornucopia, landing ungracefully on the ground. My crossbow lands at my side and I land on my quiver, the arrows' strong, steel properties protecting them from breaking. Reina is jerking on her handcuff, making me flop around like a fish on the ground.

"Stop!" I growl, putting my hand over hers, forcefully pinning it on the ground. For a moment is looks like she wants to kill me, but she complies.

Rookie's face appears on a screen above us and I watch as she smiles at us mischievously. What puzzles me most is that I see Capitol Girl and Annabelle, along with others I'm sure were dead, looking around like they were scared for their lives. "Welcome back!" Rookie's voice rings through the arena. "Now, I know you guys may be a _bit _confused, but let me explain. You see, things have been getting . . . boring. So I brought back the tributes who brought the most excitement before!" She smiles brightly. For the first time, I see Annabelle afraid and unsure of what to do. "You'll be in shock for a while, but don't worry, it'll pass. Anyway, hello to all of you!" She smiles brightly at us and giggles as I'm still processing her announcement. "Do you like your partners?" _Partners? _"I hope you do, because if they go down, you go down with them." Her eyes glint with satisfaction, this clearly being her proudest work yet.

The camera zooms out to we can all see a mystical creature besides Rookie. I'm mesmerized by its body—tendrils of gold energy swirling around and glittering in the fluorescent lighting of the Gamemakers room.

"Now, this is a phantom, and a phantom can't be destroyed very easily." She pets the animal and she nuzzles its head into her hand. "Little miss Zelda only has one weakness . . ." She pauses, as if thinking about something. "But I can't tell you!" She giggles again, making my stomach turn. "Have fun, lovelies!" she calls into the camera before the animals are suddenly in the arena, ready to pounce and kill.

Everyone bunches up, backing up from the approaching beasts. Reina chucks a knife at one of them, but it goes straight through, sticking in the ground at its feet.

"What the hell are those things?" she asks, shaking her head, her blonde hair falling into her face in the process.

"I'm not exactly the key person to ask that question." I speak evenly, calmly. I glance to my side and see Abigail, handcuffed to Shane Woods from District Six. When she notices me, I mouth _RUN_. She nods and I count on my fingers, _One . . . two . . . three._

We pull our partners forward and pass the phantoms, sprinting out to the cornucopia. I hear running footfalls behind us and turn to see a phantom chasing after us. A couple. I take a shot with my crossbow and the phantom drops dead. Its tendrils swell and burst into light, the animal vanishing in smoke.

"Silver!" I yell, climbing onto the Cornucopia.

"What?" Shane asks, breathless as he pulls Abigail up.

"Silver is their weakness," I breathe. Abigail wraps her free arm around me in a hug and I do the same.

"Yeah, okay, shoot the then!" Reina yells at me, gesticulating at the phantoms clawing at the metal surface of the Cornucopia. I shoot her a nasty glare and she keeps quiet.

"I hadn't thought of that," I say sarcastically, jerking her forward so I can reload. It's going to be hell to reload this quickly from now on. Or, rather, at all. I turn around and shoot another phantom, the same thing happening. A few yards away, I see Eve Ransom get taken down by a phantom and Tiana Reeder falling down with her. She tries to push the now-corporeal animal away from Eve, but eventually another phantom comes up behind her and clamps its teeth down on her neck. I wince and look away, but Reina only shakes her head. Two cannons go off.

Then, poor little Sundari and Connor are taken down, at which I can't bring myself to look. I turn my head away as I hear two more cannons. I look at Abigail and turn so she's facing me. "Still allies?"

"Still allies," she confirms.

"Wait, what?" Shane asks, looking between us both. "I'm not allies with you."

"Now you are," I say back, readjusting on the cold metal.

"I don't trust her," Reina jerks a hand at Abigail. With my cuffed hand, I pushed her back.

"I do." I look at her with a very intense look, surprising even myself. "And that means you do, too, all right?" After a moment, she nods. I turn to Shane and chuckle a bit. "And you, Mister Fabulous, are just gonna have to deal with it, okay?"

"But I—"

"_Okay_?" I repeat. "She's my ally. And you're her partner now. You're in this."

He looks at me for a moment, as if examining me. "Fine," he finally says.

We silently slide off the Cornucopia and bolt for the woods. We try to go in the direction I heard the water coming from when the Games began, but there's already another pair of tributes going that way. We take a slight turn to our right and go that way, figuring it'd be just as easy to find.

Playtime is over now. It's really time to wake up now.

Tiana Reeder – District 8

Eve Ransom – District 12

Sundari – District 5

Connor Berry – District 8


	6. Another Bloodbath?

_*Rookie*_

The camera turns off and I giggle, twirling one of my curls around my index finger. I start at how malicious my giggle was, but I shrugged it off.

I know the one who is going to win; I knew as soon as I interviewed them in the Capitol Square. But I know I have to drag it out for the Capitol; they hate it when The Games are cut short.

"Mom!" I hear my daughter, Sugar, call to me from the door of the Gamemakers Room. I turn around, my dress swishing around my upper calves, as she jogs towards me.

"Hello, my darling!" A wide smile crosses my face as I scoop her up in a hug. I'm so lucky her name wasn't drawn at the reaping this year, although I know she would have won without a doubt if it had been.

"Mom, when is it _my _turn to give them a challenge? You told me that I could this year and I've already told all my friends!" Her blue eyes shine with expectancy, praying for a good answer from me.

I had told her that . . . _why _did I tell her that? It's such a huge responsibility and she's only fourteen! That was one of my stupider moments, I believe.

"All right, honey. You . . . you may make tomorrow's announcement to the tributes. But _please _tell me what you're going to do before you do it?" I plead, squeezing her shoulders lightly.

Sugar nods eagerly, a large, white smile crossing her face. She wraps her arms around me, almost making me fall onto the Gamemakers table. "Oh, thank you! Thank you! Thank you!"

I manage a smile before she ran out of the room. I sigh, crossing my arms across my chest and shaking my head at my daughter, all the while wondering what she'll come up with for tomorrow.

_*Vervain*_

As Reina, Abigail, Shane, and myself sprint through the woods, Reina trips on a root extruding from a towering maple tree. She takes me down with her and I grab onto Abigail's sleeve for balance, making herself and Shane fall onto the hard-packed dirt with us. We let out a unanimous grunt as we land, a soreness immediately taking to my shoulder. Already angry with Reina as it is—I really have no specific reason to, other than being one of the most disagreeable people I've ever met in the course of my eighteen years on this planet—I shoot her a mean glare, making her pull back. The stress of this is taking a severe toll on me, especially today. Being chased by many of Rookie's multicolored mutts, a near-death encounter with Trinity Lee, almost losing Abigail. Being in The Hunger Games is one of the worst things I've ever encountered. I hate everything to do with it. Everything.

"Sorry," Reina mutters, sitting up on the dirt.

"Oh, it's fine," I sigh exasperatedly, running a stiff hand through my hair. I look at her. "I'm sure you're just as stressed as I am. I know your brother is in these Games, too. Reef, right?" She only nods, looking to the ground and becoming very interested in a crumpled leaf. I know I've touched on a touchy subject when her shoulders tense at the mention of his name. "That must be like hell for your family."

"I guess," she says, folding the tip of the leaf down. "I'm not there to know."

I decide to close that book and turn back to Abigail. "You okay, Abby? Hurt?"

She shakes her head, her brunette bangs falling into her dirty face. "I'm okay. Relatively unscathed."

"Well, I'm not." Shane's angry, disgruntled voice makes my ears perk up, even though they know very well it's not him. Without the angry and in-pain tones, he sounds exactly like— "I cut my hand."

"Oh!" Abigail practically jumps up. "We have something for that! Don't we, Vervain?"

"We do," I say with a smile, unzipping my red pack with Reina's assistance. I pull out Sage's canteen with the silver zebra blood in it.

"What's in there?" Shane asks, cradling his cut hand close to his stomach.

"An antidote to any sort of cut you may have." The pride in my voice makes me smirk a little. I'm never proud. At least not outwardly. If I ever am I don't ever show it; I'm too afraid of offending people half the time. I guess that's gone to hell.

I unscrew the cap as Shane holds his hand out. I pour a couple drops on his cut and he lurches back. I curse at him but he still keeps back.

"The hell is that?"

"Zebra blood," I say, rolling my eyes. It's already on his hand, so I close the canteen.

"Zebra . . ."

"The stripy horsey thing?" I wave him off, repacking the canteen. "Kind of purple?"

"Oh."

"Rub it in."

"All right . . ."

The effects are immediate: Shane lets out a low moan as the blood is rubbed into his cut. When his thumb comes away, the cut is gone and the silver blood absorbed.

"That's amazing." He shakes his head in wonder.

"Isn't it?" Abigail says, smiling.

We spent the rest of the day, going by fantastically quickly—probably done by the Gamemakers so their next challenge can be brought forth. Joy—pretty much just talking. We got to know each other. Reina is a Career and was with them early-on in The Games until she decided to separate; this fact made me flinch a little, but she seems nice enough. Shane hunts for his family in the woods surrounding District Six. I'd thought that hunting was forbidden, going by the stories I'd heard in training from the District Twelve people, who have seen people poach in the woods and get whipped, but I suppose in Six it may be a little different. In Eleven, if you eat the crops, even if it's only one little berry, you get killed on the spot. There are so many of us, we can't afford it. Everyone needs an equal share; no one gets any more than anyone else. That rule was learned very quickly by most everyone.

"Your district seems harsh, Vervain," Shane comments, straddling a sturdy branch aside Abigail as the sun sets. My knees are pulled up to my chest and my free arm is wrapped around them, my chin resting on my knee, so it's a little hard to nod, but I do.

"It is," I answer, remembering a case when I got to eat an entire bunch of black cherries up one of the orchard trees without anyone noticing when I was fifteen: I'd been working all day and and I was starving; hadn't eaten all day except for some bread and jam for breakfast. It was mid-afternoon, everyone else was on the ground. I concealed myself in the thick blossoms and ate away, savoring every last bite as I hung out with a mockingjay. I even fed the black and white bird a little piece. I still feel bad about it to this day. "I once ate some cherries, though. No one did anything."

"Without permission?" Abigail asks, her eyes wide. I nod, smiling a little. "Wow. How'd you do it?"

"The blossoms were especially thick in the trees that season. It was easy to stay up there without being seen." I sigh, thinking of who I may have taken those cherries from. "I managed to fill my basket though, so no one suspected a thing."

"Nice." Reina smiles at me and nudges my ribs with her elbow.

I look over to Abigail and see her gazing at a wooden object in her hand. "What's that, Abby?"

She looks up at me and smiles. "It's an owl. See, my brother and I are big wood carvers. It's a hobbie and a job for us. He carved this for me _years _ago. He gave it to me when we said goodbye." Her eyes travel to the ground below us. For a moment we're all silent, vulnerable human beings. Not out to kill each other, but to just have one peaceful, moment of silence. The mockingjays are singing to each other a serene tune that makes me want to fall asleep. I extend my legs along the length of the branch Reina and I share and lean my head back on the trunk of the maple tree. Once my eyes close, I fall right asleep.

I'm awoken in mid-morning by the blinding sun casting its rays on my eyes. I look around groggily to everyone else, already awake.

"Did I miss something?" I ask, bringing my knees back up.

"Nope. We just didn't sleep." Shane is fiddling with a brown leather bracelet around his wrist—his district token.

"Not a lot anyway," Abigail chimes in, looking at something in the distance. I look to Reina, but she attributes nothing to the conversation.

Suddenly, I feel a feeling of relief on my left wrist. I look down to see that the handcuffs have broke off. They look broken, anyway, even though nothing happened to make them look such. I lift my free wrist up, rubbing it intently.

"What?" is all I can think to say.

"We're free!" Shane cries.

Our happiness is short lived, however, because the sky turns black again. No sooner another spotlight is shown on us. As if I knew, I grip my crossbow tightly and make sure my pack and quiver are secure on my back. Meeting my expectations, we're flung out of the tree. A severe sinking feeling is in my chest as we fly the short way back to the Cornucopia. I land on a patch of flowers, cushioning my fall to some degree. The sky becomes light again and the bright sun covers everything. I see the other ten tributes are here as well. Annabelle, Axel, Reina, Reef, Shane, Abby, Tiana, me, Eve, and Alia. Eighteen down. The ones brought back from the dead are still visibly shaky and fumbling around as they try to walk. I stay seated, resting from the flight.

A face then appears in the sky. Not Rookie's, but a younger girl who resembles here—mostly in her cheekbones and lips.

"Well, hello to all of you!" Her high-pitched voice rings through the arena. For those of you who do not know me, my name is Sugar—daughter of Rookie Evelyns!" She flips her rainbow-colored hair behind her shoulder, just like her mother does, and giggles, just like her mother does. It takes me a moment for her name and hair color to soak in. I feel like someone has just dumped the contents of a sack of sugar on me, the overwhelming sense of sweet emanating from this girl from the Capitol almost making me dizzy. Sugar Evelyns's hair and unnaturally blue eyes burn my eyes and soul respectively. "Some of my friends and I have decided that things aren't exciting enough here in this year's Hunger Games. Am I right?" _Absolutely not, you psychopath_, I think. "So we decided to bring you back to where it all started: the Cornucopia. For more excitement, of course!" She smiles, flashing her extremely white teeth, obviously not naturally-colored. As far as I'm concerned, if your teeth are so white that they're blue, you're doing something wrong. "Happy Hunger Games! And may the odds be _ever _in your favor." She laughs before the screen zooms out, fizzles out, and we're left alone at the Cornucopia. I'm wondering what massacre is going to happen before I see all that is stuffed inside the metallic horn—so much food. And knives. And arrows. Everything I need; everything everyone here needs.

Our food supply is running dangerously low and I've lost a few arrows by now. I look to Abigail, who looks to me for an answer. I have none to give. Suddenly, a cannon goes off despite no one dying, and as if instinct takes us all over, we sprint for the horn.

I stay away from everyone else, grabbing a couple loaves of bread and stuffing them in my pack. I take a couple apples as well before I'm noticed. By Alia. I've killed her once before The Games ever really began, and now she's back.

She takes me by my shoulders and takes me down, my pack falling to the feet of Abigail, who takes it immediately. I inwardly thank her before Alia starts to overpower me. She's taller than I am, but by no means is she stronger. I wrap my arm around her neck and get on top of her, my skills in Krav Maga coming back to me. It's a skill common in Eleven, as a hobbie and a means of putting on shows for money, and I'm good at it. Really good.

I wrap my legs around one of Alia's as I'm on top of her and wrestle her down. The sun catches the reflection of something shiny to my left. A knife! I quickly take hold of it. I look Alia in her brownish green eyes; she's seen the knife.

"I'm truly sorry," I say to her. I shut my eyes and strike downwards on her throat. She lets out a croak as I twist the knife, making sure she's out. A cannon fires and I know she's dead. I open my eyes and rip the knife out of her throat, quickly recollecting myself.

As soon as I stand, Eve Ransom comes up to me, threatening my life with a machete. I deflect her shot with my knife and kick her hard in her stomach, sending her stumbling backward. I pick up my _preloaded_ crossbow, I've learned this lesson before, and shoot her clean through her left eye. Cannon.

I turn away and find Abigail struggling with Reef Alkress. She has her hands on a bag of food and he's trying to take it from her. I immediately spring forward and put him in a headlock, Abigail still in his grasp.

"Let me go!" he screams at me.

"No!" I shout back, ringing his neck. "Let _her _go!"

"No!"

An exchange is made between us grappling-wise and I ultimately overpower him, whipping around and driving the knife into the back of his neck at the base of his skull. I drive it deep, driving him to the ground. Abigail squirms from underneath him and retrieves the bag of food, panting and gasping for breath. Reef's cannon blares and Reina sprints towards us.

"Nooooo!" she screams, falling to her knees. "Reef! _Reef_!_"_ I feel sorry for her. Very sorry. I look between her and Reef, hesitating, until she looks at me with a death glare, making my heart stop. "I'LL KILL YOU, LEHANE!"

In response to her lunging forward to me, I try to throw the knife at her, but it only catches on her jacket sleeve, cutting her shallowly. She doesn't even notice the blood trickling down her arm as she tackles me. I fall to my back, wrestled there by Reina. Abigail tries to yank her off, but is backfisted in the jaw by Reina. I take personal offense to this, knocking Reina in the temple with the butt of my crossbow. She yelps and falls of off me. She holds her head tightly in her arms; the pain must me excruciating judging by her reaction.

When I see her eyes, her pupils are blown. My eyes widen at the sight and I gasp. Then, she starts sporadically jerking around and shaking. She's having a seizure! She has a brain hemorrhage!

I look on at her and shake my head. Abigail looks at me as well.

"Should we . . ."

"We should," I say. "She's suffering."

I reload my crossbow and point it at her head, frowning all the way. It takes me a moment to gain composure enough to do it, but when I'm finally ready to squeeze the trigger, I say, "Sorry, sister." That jerks my heart in all which ways as I shoot her. Her suffering stops and a cannon sounds. Alia, Eve, Reef, and Reina. All dead by my hand.

Abigail jerks me towards the Cornucopia and we gather more supplies. We have the loaves of bread, her sack of food, more arrows, some extra garments, and more water. We, as allies again, sprint back to the forest, leaving everyone else behind in their second bloodbath. My heart aches for Reina, but I quickly shake it off as we continue back towards the pond we found before, taking intervals for bites of bread and sips of water. We even split an energy bar from Abigail's stash. Once we arrive at the pond, we wash our faces in the spring water and rinse our hands of blood and dirt. What a day.

Alia Flickerman — Capitol

Eve Ransom — District 12

Reef Alkress — District 4

Reina Alkress — District 4


	7. Dehydration

I slowly awake in a pile of spring green leaves, my golden crossbow at my right and my quiver of silver arrows in the crook of my arm. My back is sore and I have a cramp in my left hand. I reach up to the upper left portion of my forehead and feel something warm and wet. Still lying down, my fingers come over my eyes and I see them dotted red with my own blood. Where am I?

I slowly look about, noticing that I am no longer with Abigail and no longer at our camp. I sit up a little too quickly, making my back hurt even more. I wince and seethe through my teeth as I look around, brushing a loose lock of hair out of my face, my fingers brushing against the grainy dirt that's caked on my cheek. I work it off as I continue surveying. I lift my crossbow, ready to strike, but nothing ever comes.

I look up to the early-morning sky—a light lavender color devoid of any sort of cloud—and the faces of those we've lost flash through it. I inwardly count how many are left—seven. Six more to go until I leave Eleven and move to the Capitol with my family; to enjoy the riches that await me there and be famous—don't get me wrong, though; fame is not something I aspire to. But if fame means fortune and if fortune means life, I'm in. I lower my crossbow as I sigh, sinking down to sitting on my legs. I count how many days I've been here now—five. Only five days and twenty-one tributes are gone. How have I made it this far? I'm strong, but some of those who have died are stronger. I'm not as tall, beautiful, capable, or charismatic as some of those people and yet I've outlived them. How?

Then it comes to me. Determination. I'm not saying I have any more a reason to keep going than anybody else here, but the faces that flash through my mind every other second—my mother, my father, my little sisters, brother, and Jade—make my heart race and a shot of adrenalin shoot through my gut. Whenever I feel like quitting, giving up, or anything like that, their faces show in my head. I've always been an independent person, but when it comes to them, I need them. They're my rocks; they're what keeps me grounded. I'm what keeps them going since my father is in District Twelve. They need me, too. I can't let them lose me, too.

I hoist myself up onto my two feet and realize that I have never seen this part of the arena before. I look around quickly, my braid falling over my left shoulder. All I see is a thick forest of wide-trunked trees, bushy collections of flowers I've never seen before, and a little hedgehog snacking on some some beetle larvae. This place is completely unfamiliar to me. I shake my head, trying to clear my mind; to make it clear. There's a misty, moist fog that cools my skin and dampens it. I take a couple steps forward and even the ground has an unfamiliar feeling to it—spongy and wet and almost black. I scamper quickly across it, hoping to find some hard-packed soil soon. I don't.

I don't have my red pack; Abigail probably has it. I search around my pockets to see it they were kind enough to leave me some food or water, but I find nothing. I try to take a deep breath, but the cold fog sharply bites the insides of my nose, making me jerk in pain. I rub my nose comfortingly as I continue on. Every crack of a leaf startles me, putting me more on edge. Paranoia sets in soon and my heart pounds against my ribcage.

Then, the screen I know all too well appears in the sky, along with a face that is, I dare say, comforting at a time like this. I still detest this woman, but it's good to see another human face.

"Hello, everyone," Rookie says solemnly. "I have an announcement." She holds out her hand as if she expects someone to interrupt her with an inquiry for an autograph. "Instead of one of my many beautiful pets coming to give you all some well-needed punishment," She pauses, a look of anger in her eyes, before the anger flows away, a look of calmness sweeps over them, "I have decided that this year, there will be two winners of The Hunger Games."

My heart jerks around in all different directions as I hear the news. My eyes bug out of my head and I actually smile. All this time I've denied thinking about how Abigail and I will deal with the end of The Games, but now . . . we can both win. Without a doubt, I will be taking her to the Capitol with me.

"I will give you two days to find your . . ." She pauses to giggle again, "_partners_, and meanwhile, at the cornucopia, there will be something you desperately need."

I hear a distant draining noise—like water going down a sink. My ears perk up as it fades away.

"Water." The two-syllable word escaping from Rookie's bright pink lips makes my entire body rattle. "There is no more water anywhere in the arena. Except, well . . . there is some . . . at the cornucopia." She smiles, making my stomach lurch. "Good luck to all of you." She giggles before the screen goes black and fades away.

Flight is essential. If there is no longer any running water in this arena, and all the moisture I have to comfort me is this wet woolen blanket of a fog, I have to move. I've been to the cornucopia twice in these Games, and quite frankly, I don't want it. But I do want water.

I begin swiftly across the spongy black dirt, slinging my crossbow over my shoulder for easier maneuverability. I dart through trees, pushing past some of the low-hanging branches and ducking underneath others. My combat boots are very useful with this ground, the treads digging into it and pushing me forward aptly. I blink hard to remove the fog from my dry eyes, but that doesn't work.

I've been moving for a couple hours—probably almost three—before I have to stop. Breathing hard, I slump against a tree and sink to the ground, sitting on some soft green plants. My throat is already dry and scratchy from my brisk movements. I long for water, but I know it's no use to just _want _it; I have to go get it. I blink hard and push myself back up, continuing down my path. The brush is thick and there are a lot of fallen trees, making me have to break out my meager skills in parkour. I've used it to maneuver through trees in the orchards before, but nowhere else. As the sun shows its face to me, there are shafts of light shining through the fog. One is on my face, warming it considerably. I think about the cameras being on me right now as I look up into the canopy of leaves above me. My dirty face, my preserved flower necklace, tendrils of loose hair stuck to my face with sweat, and the golden light illuminating my face—I think about how tragic I must look. I look up and shrug my shoulders to whomever may be watching.

"I'll see you guys soon, okay?" I croak to my family. "I promise." I wipe the sweat from my upper lip and continue, walking briskly through the lit-up fog and patterned shadows.

By mid-afternoon my throat is desert-dry and my legs are fatigued. On the bright side, I've found regular ground. The hard dirt is comforting to my feet, but at the same time, my feet are sore and aching. I collapse into a bunch of fallen leaves and soft moss. I pull my shirt up over my nose and mouth for no reason, shut my eyes, and curl up into a little ball. My tongue feels like a sheet of sandpaper in my mouth now, grinding against the roof of my mouth. Occasionally, when I swallow, I'll dry heave for a bit and then calm down, resting my head hopelessly on the bed of moss. His voice rings in my ears over and over again.

_"I know you stole those cherries. But it's cool; I stole an orange once."_

_ "If you could try to arrange the grapes so they actually look desirable instead of like a cluster of rocks, that'd be great."_

_ "Never, under any circumstances, eat from the bushes. People have eyes in their ankles around here. You'll never hear the end of it. Well, you will. You'll be dead."_

_ "After I say this, I don't want you to deny it, I don't want you to get angry, nothing like that, okay? I love you."_

At one point I'm punching the moss to bits with my clenched fist. He told me that only a day before the reaping. I couldn't look him in the eye after that. Of course I wanted to say it back. I really did. But . . . it was the end of the day and we had to clock out. And the next day, I had to get ready for the reaping. I never got the chance to say it back to him. His blond hair, upturned in the front like feathers; his blue eyes, the exact color of perfectly ripened blueberries. I love him back. Why can't I say it now?

"I love you, too, Mica . . ." I manage to croak out, barely audible. I wonder if the cameras caught it.

I have a sudden urge to get up again. I push my weak limbs off the ground and use my sleeves to wipe the slippery sweat from my face. I take my loaded bow in my right hand and continue down the vague trail I've found for as long as I can.

When night falls I don't decide to find a home for the night; I have to. My legs refuse to move anymore—shaking like cooked noodles and numb down to the bone. I don't have the energy to climb up a tree, so I lean against one and rest. I wish I had my sleeping bag, but I can only assume that they took it away when they threw me miles across the arena in my sleep. I end up keeling over to my side, zipping up my jacket, pulling my hood as far over my face as it would go, and crying my eyes out. I sob into the ground as the air dries and grows bitterly cold with night.

I don't look good when I cry, but that's not why I don't want the cameras to see me right now: I don't want them to see me because of my younger siblings. By now it must be ten or eleven, so they should be in bed, but during The Hunger Games, bedtimes are nonexistent in my household. That being said, they're probably watching their older sister cry her eyes out onto the dry, unforgiving arena floor in a dehydrated heap, about to die. That is the reason. Rose, Fawn, and Leo are the reasons. They've always looked up to me. Even when Jade was alive, I was their rock. And that's saying something, seeing as Jade was ten times the person I am. Kind, forgiving, sweet as brown sugar, the best harvester our section ever saw. But me? Now I'm just as weak as anything, no longer a rolemodel for those kids. I keep crying until I've exhausted myself, unable to sob anymore. The moist, salty tears staining my cheeks are no comfort to me. After a long while of lying there, motionless, I finally drift off to a dreamless, black sleep.

I awake when the sun is just rising. My first thought is, _Man, I'm thirsty_. I manage to prop myself up on my elbows and look around. The sun is still in the east, rising up to meet us. It's rising quickly—a clear work of the Gamemakers. I push myself up, resisting the pointless urge to swallow so moisten my throat, knowing that it wouldn't work and would bring only pain with it. I trek down the dirt as quickly as I can without exhausting myself furthermore.

Soon enough, hunger takes over. I haven't eaten in forever and my stomach is growling loudly. I come across where a pond used to be; it's not our pond, but it's a different one. One with dying flowers around it and rocks lining the bottom. In the center, I see a mauve-colored otter. My mouth twitches at the sight of it. It makes my hunger intensify. Without thinking, I lift my crossbow and get a direct hit. It falls with a thud on the rocks and I run to it. I take my arrow out of it and gather kindling in the center of the pond, kneeling on the rocks and trying to start a fire the way Abigail and I did. My hands are shaking wildly, mostly in anticipation of food. I do my best to steady my hands as I'm on my belly, staring straight at the kindling. Eventually, after far too long, there's smoke and then a spark. Everything is so dry, it keeps. I hurriedly skin the otter and clean a piece with a leaf, afterward sticking a stick through it and holding it over the fire, all the while building it as well. I'm still cold, so I sit cross-legged in front of the fire and try to warm up as I cook the meat. After it's cooked on both sides, I take a gallant bite. It tastes like fish and is oily. But it's actually pretty filling. I cook the rest of it and sit there for a while, taking small bites of the fishy meat. The oil makes me feel a little better, but I'm still longing for water. It's all I can thinking about . . . water. _Water_. WATER. _You need water, Vervain, find some!_

Eventually, I hit one of the rocks with the palm of my hand to get the thoughts out of my head.

"You all right there?"

I whip around at the voice. When my eyes meet Reina's, every instinct to flee courses through my body in a shock. She's leaning unstably against a tree and looks almost crazy.

"Rookie brought me back," she says maliciously. I pick up my crossbow and quiver and begin to back up. She only follows. "She brought back Reef, too, but . . . we were separated." Her words are far apart and low. She stumbles as she walks forward. I gasp. "Alia, too. I think Rookie really wants that Capitol bitch to win, huh? No surprise, I mean . . . she is beautiful, isn't she?"

"Reina . . ." I croak, absolutely terrified. "Reina."

"What?" she barks. I jump, quickening my pace. I lift my crossbow and she stops. So do I. "Whoa, whoa, okay!" She puts her hands up. "You already killed me once, you don't have to again."

"Yes, I do," I say, quiet and mouselike.

Before she can speak again, I fire my crossbow and get her in the neck. She's still a ghost to me, not at all real. She's not her. She's a mutt Rookie brought back. That's what these tributes are after they're brought back! They're stronger and more vicious when she brings them back from the dead . . . there's something else there other than them. Something to fill in the holes resurrection brings. I sprint down down the trail. I'm feeling more energized from the meat, but my tongue is still dry as sand and my head still hurts like hell.

I keep going for hours. I feel like I'll sometime reach the cornucopia or the end of the arena or somewhere, but I don't. Just more trees. A valley here or there, a couple clearings. But no water. Nowhere.

It's late-afternoon when I want to cry again. My stomach is lurching in all different directions, jumping up and making me dry heave more. My head feels like it's going to explode. I see the faces of those I've killed right in front of me, making me spazz out in different directions. I soon accept that I'm dead. Even though I'm walking, I'm dead. I am the walking dead. My teeth chatter wildly and and I clench my jaw too tight to make them stop. I'm whimpering now. I'm so weak . . . I can't do this. I can't win The Hunger Games . . . why had I thought I could? Determination? Ridiculous.

I pull myself along, at some points crawling on all fours. I can't help but hope they're not filming me right now . . . just because I look so pathetic.

Soon enough, I can't anymore. As the sun begins to set, I'm coughing up acidic bile that burns my throat. I'm sobbing, even. Sobbing meaninglessly. I end up collapsing next to a large bush. I look up to it and see blood red roses. I brush a silky petal with my fingers before my eyes shut involuntarily. I think, _This is a pretty place to end my life_. I honestly think I'm dying before I open my eyes a few seconds later, greeted by light. I slept a dreamless sleep. I cough violently upon rising, moaning weakly as I try to get on all fours. I look over to the roses, bright and beautiful and alive. I inwardly wish for some dew to be on the petals, but I am granted with no such wish. My vision is a little blurry. I bring my index finger to my tongue, feeling its dry, sandpaper surface. I almost can't close my mouth for fear everything will stick together, breathing through my nose too painful.

I'm about to fall down again when I hear chatter. My head jerks to my left and beyond a few layers of trees, I can't see a wide expanse. _Is that it_?

I shove myself up and force my feet to move. I feel like I'm being choked by every breath, my eyes are going in and out, and my head is throbbing like never before. The pain is so great it's like a hammer is being thwacked against my head over and over and over and over and over and over again. I drag my feet along the ground and force myself to push the branches aside. I trip over a branch and go crashing to the ground, my face meeting soft grass and burning sunlight. When it hit the ground, a painful grunt escapes my lips.

"Vervain?"

The familiar, hoarse voice makes me jerk up to a sitting position. Suddenly I have more energy than I have in the past two days. I look around, the sun biting at my eyes. Finally, I see her—crawling on her side, her brown hair—blonde in the sunlight—in her face. She has two people chasing after her. I load my crossbow faster than I ever have before and shoot Axel in the head. Annablle, who he was wish, skids to a stop and falls on her hands. Quickly, I shoot her as well. Two cannons go off as I run to Abigail.

"Abby," I gasp, pulling her up by her sleeves into a hug. My vision is still a little in-and-out, but I can see enough to know she's just as in bad a shape as I am.

"Vervain!" she exclaims hoarsely, wrapping her arms tightly around me.

"I—" I'm cut off by something shining in the corner of my eye. I look over to see something that jerks my every being towards it—the cornucopia.

"Hey!"

A bark from behind me jerks me from my trance. I whip around and am quickly taken down by Reef Alkress. Panic courses through my veins as I try to overpower him—I can't. I'm too exhausted. My rush of adrenalin is gone. As he pins my shoulders down, however, one thing he says to me wrenches my heart.

"I shouldn't be here." As he says it, he puts a knife in my hand. I look between it and him repeatedly. "And I don't want to be either."

"What?"

"DO IT!"

I do it. I stab him in the heart as his wish and he falls dead. A cannon goes off as I look at him puzzlingly. Abigail has the same look on her face.

We slowly make our way to the cornucopia, driven by our insane thirst. Then I see her. Alia Flickerman. We stand in a triangle around the water supply, licking out lips eagerly. We wait.


	8. The Victor

Abigail, Alia, and I stand in a triangle around the cornucopia. All of us are looking at the water within it. We all want to take a drink . . . each of us.

"Okay," Alia says, putting her hands up. I look at her, squinting at the sunlight coming down into my eyes. "Let's just . . . let's just all drink, okay? No killing . . . just a drink."

I look at Abigail and she nods eagerly, almost pleadingly.

I don't answer; I only sprint to the water supply with the others. Us three girls all tear open a bottle and unceremoniously chug them down. The crystalline water pouring down our throats and dribbling down our chins, icy cold and replenishing. We continue drinking until we can't anymore. I toss a plastic bottle aside and gasp for breath, wiping my face clean with my hands and smiling. We sit around for a while, backs up against the cornucopia, taking tiny sips. I redo my braid. Abigail dozes off for a minute before jerking back away humorously. Alia messes with her nails.

It's almost as if, for a moment, we're just acquaintances with no fatal agenda. No desire to kill each other. We're just sitting around, replenishing our bodies, and being calm. Not like friends or anything, but good enough.

That is, until an odd smell arises in the air. We all notice it—a heavy sent of sugar. It's almost unpleasant. With the smell, I feel my body strengthening. All the pain I've been feeling today washes away in an instant, bringing an immense feeling of relief. The blood is gone from my forehead, the cut with it, I'm no longer suffering from a throbbing head. My tongue feels normal again, I feel like I could run five miles. We all stand, apparently all feeling the same thing. We look and feel like we did on the first day only one week ago.

I stand alone in front of Alia, and Abigail is off at an angle to my left. I can win with only one of these girls . . . and I know exactly which one it will be. But, knowing Rookie and her Capitol favoritism, she'll be gunning for Alia to pull something out of her back pocket; or she'll put something there for her to find.

Suddenly, concrete walls spring up out of the ground, surrounding myself and my opponents around the cornucopia. The force knocks us all to the ground, and immediately we are flung to different corners. I quickly scramble upward, seeing the other girls doing the same thing. I've dropped my crossbow at the cornucopia, but I still have my quiver of arrows. I'm thinking about how I can throw the arrows into Alia's eyes like I did to Trinity Lee when the grass starts to grow.

I high-step to prevent my feet getting ensnared in the rapidly-growing grass. I watch in horror as it reaches above my head. I look around for a way out, but the concrete is far too high to climb up and I can't hardly see two feet in front of me.

Then, my quiver dissipates into thin air, leaving me stumbling forward a little. As far as I know, I have nothing to protect myself with. Until I am granted another crossbow.

My old one was battered and beat up, but this one, gold with accents of black and white, was shiny and new. I pick it up and run my hands over it, admiring the smooth surface. It is loaded with only one arrow; I receive no extras.

I don't know where Abigail and Alia are, but I know that I have to kill the latter to emerge from these Games victorious.

I ready myself, inching along the rough concrete walls in a fighting stance. I keep my crossbow down at my legs, my index finger shaking on the trigger as I know once I squeeze it, this arrow will either make me a victor or kill me.

"Vervain!"

Hearing my name shouted like that makes my heart race. I angrily push heavy blades of grass out of my way as I venture into the forest. "Abigail?" I call. "Abby?"

"Vervain!" she calls again. I hear rustling. A lot of it. The enclosure we're in is far larger that I had thought, as I keep finding myself at more concrete. "Where are you?"

"Follow my voice!" I shout back to her, momentarily forgetting that there are three of us here.

As I'm going back into the forest of grass, I come up on the empty cornucopia. It's mouth is devoid of all the water it once held. I'm about to call out to Abigail again, leaning my left hand on the cold metal surface, when a dagger is plunged into my abdomen.

I keel over with a sharp scream as glass tendrils of pain shoot through my entire body, shattering upon impact with one another. The dagger is taken out of me, blood taking it's place, and I see brown and purple hair come down at my side.

"Took that from your little friend," Alia whispers to me as I choke out small whimpering sounds from my agape mouth. "Don't worry, though, she'll be all right; only unconscious." She shoves me to the ground and I land on my side, clutching my stab wound with my life. I shut my eyes tightly as the pain washes over me like a bucket of water. "Now I get to play a game!" Alia looks down at me with bright eyes, her face pulled back into a terrifying grin. "I get to see which one of you will be going with me to the Capitol! Or, you know . . . maybe I can work out killing you both." She disappears into the brush and I am left there to die.

I take a look down at my hands and arms—blood. Everywhere is blood. The wound is deep and I can't tell if I'm supposed to know if any vital organs had been damaged. All I know is that I'm slowly dying and so is Abigail from the sound of what Alia said.

Suddenly, the will to live kicks in and I'm sitting up, groaning loudly in pain as I contort the wound. I grip the cornucopia as I stand, picking up my crossbow. I keel over again, unable to stand on my own accord. I feel like more glass is shattering within me, pain everywhere. I walk with tiny steps, hunched over, to the side of the cornucopia. I find a little catch in the side of it and hoist myself up, falling back down after trying to lift my weight.

I hit the ground out of anger at myself and get back up. I manage, with shooting pain, to get up onto the cornucopia. At the top of it, I would be able to see Abigail and Alia. The grass doesn't go as high as the tail of the cornucopia does. If I can get there, I can surely save her. The ringing in my ears cancels out these thoughts and encourages me to keep going. I slowly crawl across the metal, staining it with the blood that seeps through the cracks between my fingers. I dig my nails into it, pulling myself further along. My vision gets blurry from blood loss and I yelp, almost as if I'm a sad little animal calling for help.

But you know what? I'm not a sad little animal. I am the co-victor of The Hunger Games with Abigail Turner if it is the last thing that I do. I am not a sad little animal. I am strong; stronger than Alia Flickerman, and stronger than these Games. I am not a sad, injured, defenseless little animal. I'm at the tail of the cornucopia, and all I have to do is climb it.

I'm feeling woozy by the time I'm standing, ready to fall back down into the grass and give up. But I don't view that as an option. I put the crossbow over my shoulder and ready myself to release the pressure from the stab wound. When I do, more blood will flow out of it. I would probably die.

But I don't care.

I release my hand from the wound and I pull myself up onto the tail, scraping together all my strength and letting out a loud scream of pain. I made it. I'm on top. I take a small moment to rest afterwords and I quickly press both of my arms onto my stomach, trying to suppress the blood flow.

By now I almost can't see. I blink hard as I ready my crossbow, searching for them. I finally catch a glimpse over the grass of a brunette and a lighter brunette. I can't tell who is who, but I see one of them raising a dagger over the other. In a brief moment of clear vision, I see Abigail cowering underneath the dagger. I take aim at the darker brunette, Alia, and squeeze the trigger just as the dagger is baring down on Abigail, the arrow entering her head right where her cerebellum should be.

Alia falls dead for the third time in eight days, and a cannon goes off. I practically collapse. I lay on my back on the tail of the cornucopia, my legs hanging off one end and my shoulders and head the other. The walls and grass slowly go down, and I slide down unceremoniously onto the body of the cornucopia.

A screen appears in the bright sky above me, and the pink-haired Rookie is smiling brightly down to me.

"Congratulations!" she squeals, clapping her hands together rapidly. "I present to you, the citizens of Panem, the _victor _of The Hunger Games: from District Eleven, Vervain Lehane!"

For a moment I'm smiling, lying on my side on the cold golden surface. But then I realize that she didn't say the plural of the word "victors."

I look over to where Abigail and Alia were before. They're both lying there . . . dead?

My adrenalin kicks in full speed as I practically fall off of the cornucopia. I run to her side, my legs giving out upon arrival. I hold my abdomen in one arm and her head in the other, crying as I call her name over and over again.

I only heard one cannon . . . I swear I did. Were they overlapped? Was I really too late? I couldn't have been . . . but I was. Abigail is dead because of me. I've created a loop hole . . . just like Alia said she was going to. I'm no better than her now.

I sink my face into the crook of Abigail's neck, resting on her soft brown hair. There's blood on her chest, probably from where the dagger had stabbed her. My stomach is too weak to look, so I just stay there, crying half because of my dead ally and half because I'm still in so much pain.

"Di . . . did I pass out?"

I could have jumped ten feet in the air, I was so surprised. I jerk up, eyes wide. I'm looking down at Abigail . . . who is looking back at me.

"Alia was . . ." She coughs. She coughed! "Alia was here and . . . and I think I passed out. Are you okay?" she asks, placing a hand over mine, which was covered in my own blood. The blood on her chest was from the dagger piercing her skin before I shot Alia . . . I got to her just in time.

I continue sobbing as I take Abigail in my arms, the bleeding slowing down. It's only slowing down because I'm running out of blood to have spilled out of me, but I'm okay with embracing Abigail covered in blood and all tragic-looking rather than raising my arms alone and being okay.

"What happened to you?" Abigail asks me, looking down at the stab wound. I just smile at her.

"We won," I hoarsely whisper. Her eyes go wide like dinner plates.

"Well, it appears that I've made a mistake," Rookie says, smiling warmly down at us. We both look up at her. "Ladies and gentlemen, the _victors _of The Hunger Games: from Districts Eleven and Seven, Vervain Lehane and Abigail Turner!"

We hug again, this time falling to the ground and laughing. I'm lightheaded and dizzy, but I don't care. We're laughing and smiling and crying all at the same time. We're both alive . . . we've done it. The first co-victors in Hunger Games history.

I pass out as soon as we get on the hovercraft.

The usual following events take place after that:

Our bodies are relinquished of any scars or injuries we may have had.

We're treated to an amazing dinner on the tribute train—chicken covered in an orange sweet and sour sauce, rice, a soy-tasting medley of vegetables, and a rich chocolate cake.

We have our post-Games interview with Rookie, who couldn't be happier to see us both alive and well. We watch the replay, which displays our relationship heavily. Abigail cries when she sees how I saved her, and so do I, if I'm honest.

We go on the Victory Tour, which goes surprisingly without a hitch.

When our families greet us at the train to the Capitol after we've packed up all our things, ready to head out, we all have teary reunions. Abigail bonds with my little sisters immediately on the train and our families quickly become one. Our last names get lost in it all and we're just all one big happy family.

That's why we all share on huge mansion in the center of it all in the Capitol. The emotional scars are still there, we still remember everything, but that's nothing compared to how we feel now.

What I saw in the arena will always stay with me, but it will at least fade over time. Right now, I'm just happy that I'm alive.

I am eventually visited by Mica and we are eventually engaged to be married after a long time of gingerly dancing around our feelings.

The following year, Abigail and I are both mentors for the Seven and Eleven female tributes. Needless to say, they're relatively unbearable. But what is bearable, is seeing Abigail's frustrated face at the new tribute. At least we still have each other . . . we almost didn't.

That's it for this Hunger Games. Here's hoping the next is just as exciting. At least this time I'll be watching from the sidelines.

One important lesson I've learned is that you must keep marching on, no matter what. The things I've seen in the arena were horrible, but to escape them, I just keep walking.

Right, right, right, left, right. And so on.

Trust me, it works wonders.


	9. The Victor Version 2

For a moment, I become increasingly dizzy. I almost fall over at the sight of the ground shifting and morphing beneath my leather boots.

"Is she okay?" I hear someone—a girl—ask.

"I don't know," another someone—a boy—asks.

Neither do I, boy, neither do I.

I willingly drop to my knees, gripping the ground hard for balance in this new spinning world. I throw up on the ground and fall to one hip. I look up, the faces of my opponents flashing between themselves and others. Or between others and themselves? I can't tell who's who and when I rub the back of my head, my hand catches on something just below my left ear. I pull out the sharp, thorn-like object and find between my fingers a tracker jacker stinger. My mouth falls open as I finger the hard, painful bump on my neck. Have I been hallucinating all this time? For how long? When did I get stung?

I look up at the two people in front of me. One of them offers me a bottle of water and I chug it down unceremoniously. The crystalline liquid quenches the thirst I've had for so long. I gasp for air when I finally stop.

"Should we just kill her now?" the girl asks, somewhat malicious in her inquiry to the boy. I look up at them, still unsure of their faces. By now they're just tan, blurry ovals with little dots for eyes. I blink hard to get those terrifying images out of my head. "I mean . . . why not?"

"Yeah, I guess." The boy draws some kind of weapon. A big one. I scurry backward away from them until the girl stamps the heel of her shoe onto the sleeve of my jacket, stopping me. "She'd be far too crushed to see what she's done if she comes to it."

What have I done? This doesn't make sense . . . none of it does. Tracker jacker stings would wake you from your sleep—the only time I can think this could have happened. I would have woken up . . . but wait! When I fell asleep near the rosebush last night I recall waking up in the middle of the night when something pricked my neck . . . I had thought it was only one of the rose thorns. I guess it wasn't.

The girl's heel is still stabbed into my jacket sleeve and I'm thrashing around to get out of it. When I try to unzip it while they're laughing at me, the zipper catches on the fabric and gets stuck. I curse loudly and try to rip the fabric apart. It feels like it's made of steel, it's so strong. I look up at them again and I can see the girl's vibrant red hair and the boy's short blond locks.

Just as the boy's weapon is being raised triumphantly in the air, poised and ready to kill me, the zipper is freed and I scurry out of the forsaken jacket, leaving me only in my midnight blue tank, khakis, and combat boots. I sprint away from the two, without a weapon. The boy's sharp spear-like weapon stabs the ground just near my feet as I grind to a halt—in front of a fifty-feet tall wall of concrete. I fall to my rear again, scurrying backward as four walls rise around us all and the cornucopia.

By now my vision is coming back to normal. What did they mean about what I'd done? Do I want to know?

I look back at them, both surprised and holding hands. Are they a couple? An in-Games couple? They look at me with angry expressions on their faces. Annabelle and Reef. I scramble up to my feet and hold my hands out in front of me. When Reef readies to lunge forward to grab his weapon, I stomp my foot on its body, holding it in its place in the hard-packed dirt below the grass. He stops.

"Why . . . who." I can't think of a proper question to start with. I shake my head, pressing the heel of my hand to my forehead, almost angrily. "What did you mean before?" The words come out in kind of a slur, but they seemed to understand.

"What?" Annabelle asks, flipping her bright red hair over her shoulder. She winces at me.

"Before," I say, clearing my throat, hoping that it would clear up my speech. "About . . . what . . . about what I'd done?"

They both smirk now, which scares me. My entire body tingles with dread and worry as I see that Abigail is nowhere to be found.

"Your . . . little friend?" Annabelle says, her tone sultry and low. I shut my eyes, tears threatening to break through as I remember killing who I thought was Reef . . . stabbing him in the chest. Or was it— "Don't worry, though, you didn't kill her. You killed Alia . . . again." I almost fall down with relief at the fact she didn't die because of me . . . but then I realize that she is actually dead. "I killed her."

Annabelle's triumphant smile makes my blood boil. I'm ready to run at her and kill her on the spot with my own two hands when the grass begins to ensnare my feet in it. I think it's another hallucination, but when I see Reef and Annabelle jumping around to avoid it as well, I know that it's real.

The grass grows far taller than my head; I can't hardly see two feet in front of me. I shove heavy blades of grass out of my face angrily as I struggle to find a way to see. I can't. Whenever I push more grass aside, all there is is more stupid grass. I swear I see a spot of blood on one of them, but then it disappears instantly. Hell, maybe we're all hallucinating this.

I don't realize how large the enclosure is until I just keep on hitting more concrete. I would assume that it's a maze if I didn't distinctly see four walls. Or did more come up with the grass? The idea intrigues me. I walk into a corner of concrete and it bloodies my lip. That confirms my suspicions. We're rats in a maze . . .

Only one of us needs to die, and if I die, it would be the perfect situation for those two lovebirds. Living it up in the Capitol, in love. However, if one of them dies, it would be awful for the other and myself. I feel like if that happens, my life will be in danger for the rest of my life.

I decide that I have to find the cornucopia. It's really high up and sturdy . . . I can stand on it to see Annabelle and Reef. Although, I don't know what I'd do once I got there.

Suddenly, at my feet appears a crossbow. Just like mine but not all battered and bruised. This one also has accents of black and white. It's beautiful; it's loaded with only one arrow. I pick it up and trek on through the jungle of grass blades. I keep my hand on the left wall, remembering the corn mazes Eleven would always have during the Harvest for the kids; always keep your hand on the left wall. It'll always lead to the way out.

Unfortunately, whereas that was for fun, this is for my life. Urgency spreads throughout me as I finally decide to screw it and climb up the wall. I find a corridor of two walls and sling my crossbow over my shoulder so I have free use of both of my arms. I put one of my feet up on one wall, put both of my arms on opposite sides, and push myself up off the ground. My other foot follows on the other wall and I'm off the ground, slowly ascending upwards. I've done this plenty of times in doorways at home and between trees in the orchards, but concrete is a little more difficult because it's so smooth in some places and so rough in others.

I'm twenty feet up now. Trying not to look down, I survey my surroundings. Grass still impairs my vision, but I can see that there's only a few feet of it left, the sunlight gleaming through now, whereas on the ground, it was all darkness.

I climb another ten feet, and anther ten. The grass is below me now and my legs are wobbly. My arms are tired and I'm tempted to just fall and rest; I don't.

Another ten feet and I'm at the height of the maze. It's huge. Interwoven walls of concrete surrounding the unnatural grass. I climb onto the wall to my right, balancing on all fours. I look around curiously, searching for signs of Annabelle and Reef. I crawl along the wall for a bit, looking in different corridors for sections of grass with signs of life. I think I see a couple blades shift just when a a sharp, pronged object whizzes just past my ear, sticking into the concrete. I whip my head around to see that Reef had the same idea I did: climbing the walls.

I break into a sprint on my own two feet as he chases behind me. We weave onto different walls and jump across gaps. The enclosure is very vast and large; the viewers must be getting a kick and a half out of this.

I look behind me to see Reef lagging behind. I'm far more agile than he is and I have better balance, as evidenced by his constant tripping. Finally, in the center of it all, I see a large golden object that towers above the grass: the cornucopia. I sprint for it and leap onto the giant golden object, landing like a cat on its surface with a loud metallic clunk. I look around for Reef and don't see him, but I still hide behind the cornucopia anyway. I ready my crossbow, ready for one of them to pop out at any moment.

Finally, one of them does.

Reef surprises me from the side I wasn't looking and grapples with me for my crossbow. I kick his upper leg hard, but it doesn't do a single thing to him. He's extremely strong and I've already killed him once for sure at the second bloodbath, but he's been brought back by the Gamemakers to "spice things up," and he's mad for sure now.

Eventually, he uses brute strength to disarm me with a backfist to my face. I fall down, putting pressure on where he hit me. In my district, women are revered and respected; hitting a woman is grounds for serious and abrupt punishment in Eleven, but I guess here it doesn't matter.

Suddenly, I'm picked up from behind and held tightly around my chest. I look behind me to see that Annabelle has found us. I try to shake free of her grasp, but she has a blade in her hand. I stop. Reef stands a couple yards in front of me, holding the crossbow out in front of him with one hand. Amateur.

"Any last words before _we _win, Lehane?" Reef asks, putting himself in a ready stance.

My thoughts linger over the thought that the girl holding me right now killed the girl I've been best friends with for the past eight days. My blood begins to boil again as I look at Reef. I nod and say, "Yes. Congratulations, Reef Alkress."

I kick Annabelle's shin as hard as I can and she lets go of me with a scream. Out of defense for his lover, Reef pulls the trigger on the crossbow. I, of course, duck under the line of fire and the arrow digs into Annabelle's forehead. She falls to the ground and a cannon goes off for her. I look up at Reef and can't help smirking a little bit. This moment is so delicious, I can't help but shrug cockily as I stand up again.

"You're the co-victor of The Hunger Games," I say, breathing hard as the victory cannon sounds. "With me."

"No . . ." Reef says, throwing the crossbow to the ground. "NO!" He looks at me viciously. "You planned that out!"

"I guess I did a little," I answer. "In the moment."

The maze and grass fall. The sunlight graces our faces again and lights up Annabelle's hair like Christmas lights. Reef tragically runs over to her, cradling her body in his arms. This reminds me that Abigail is dead. I sink down to my knees and throw up again, all the stress forcing what was left in my stomach—if anything, I really didn't want to look—to come up. I fall to my back as Rookie's face lights up the sky again. She smiles down warmly at us.

"Congratulations!" she coos, clapping her hands together and jumping up and down like a schoolgirl. "There you have it! Your _victors _of The Hunger Games: from Districts Eleven and Four, Vervain Lehane and Reef Alkress!"

I can't smile anymore. I roll over onto my side facing Reef and Annabelle. I shut my eyes and lay my head down on the grass, running my hand along its soft surface. I'm so unbelievably tired. I open my eyes a little more to see Reef digging his face into Annabelle's hair. I pull myself up to my knees and crawl over to them; he doesn't notice me until I clear my throat.

"Reef . . .?"

I looks at me like he wants to kill me for a second, but then his face falls to exasperation. "What?" he asks tiredly.

"I'm not saying we have to be best friends in the Capitol or anything," I say, fingering the end of my braid. "But . . . this whole thing . . . it's none of our faults, right?" He shakes his head after a long time. "Right, so . . . truce?" I extend my hand to him.

He sets down Annabelle gently and turns to me. He takes my hand and shakes it. I can practically feel the eruptions of cheering and chorus of awws emanating from . . . well, from everywhere in Panem right at this moment. "Truce. Only because we both win."

"Only because we both win," I confirm, nodding as we let each other go.

Then, the hovercraft appears to whisk us away. Suddenly, I'm extremely tired again. Reef and I make our way slowly to the descending ladder. The current freezes me in place as I'm lifted into the arms of Peacekeepers. I win. I win The Hunger Games. I made it.

The elation that I get to see my family comes over me soon. I'm somewhat brought down by Abigail's absence. I'm extremely sad; I shed a few tears.

But I did it. I'm a winner. I'm alive.

The usual post-Games events took place after that:

All the physical signs of The Hunger Games were wiped from my body. Scars gone, dirt scraped from everywhere, nails perfect ovals instead of chewed-on, ragged things.

I'm treated to an amazing dinner on the tribute train.

I'm taken home to reunite with my family. The reunion is very teary and sad, and for the few months before the Victory Tour I stay with them in our old little house. I find out eventually that Mica had been executed for stealing the crops for his family. I'm not as upset as I thought I would be over it.

The Victory Tour goes well; District Seven greets me with open arms and I'm tanked for my alliance with Abigail. I'm given a small intricate wooden star necklace that belonged to her. It's one of the necklaces I wear with me all the time.

I move to the Capitol with my family into a large mansion. The odd thing is that it feels like home. It reminds me of Eleven, but also has bits of the Capitol in it.

The mental images of The Games never leave me. They're especially bad when I mentor the next tributes from Eleven. But who knows? Maybe they'll do better than I did . . . I only think that until I remember that I won.


End file.
